Private Project

DISCLOSURE: Trans Lives On Screen

Disclosure shows how the fabled stories of Hollywood have deeply influenced how Americans feel about transgender people, and how trans people have been taught to feel about themselves. Intimate conversations with leading trans thinkers and creatives lead the way through decades of film and TV clips, including Emmy-award winning producer and Orange Is the New Black actress, Laverne Cox, Yance Ford (Oscar-nominated director of Strong Island), Chaz Bono (Emmy-nominated star of Becoming Chaz), Zackary Drucker (producer for Emmy-winning Transparent), among others.

Drawing on their personal journeys of reaction and resistance to the relentless depictions of gender subversion as deceptive, pathetic, psychotic, and slapstick, these charismatic subjects tell a very different story about some of Hollywood’s most beloved moments.

Disclosure charts this pivotal time of policy makers using decades of fear-mongering amplified in film and TV to promote policies like “bathroom bills” and a trans military ban. Alongside is a groundswell of support for trans visibility and our right to exist with dignity in every part of public life. Riding the ups and downs through the history of film and TV, Disclosure unveils the inextricable link between Hollywood storytelling and the rise of a community on the precipice of enormous change.

  • Sam Feder
    Director
    Kate Bornstein is a Queer and Pleasant Danger
  • Amy Scholder
    Producer
  • Laverne Cox
    Key Cast
    Orange is the New Black
  • Tre'Vell Anderson
    Key Cast
    LA Times Culture Critic
  • Zackary Drucker
    Key Cast
    Produer, Transparent
  • Yance Ford
    Key Cast
    Director, Strong Island
  • Lilly Wachowski
    Key Cast
    Sense8, The Matrix
  • MJ Rodriguez
    Key Cast
    POSE
  • Indya Moore
    Key Cast
    POSE
  • Jen Richards
    Key Cast
    Mrs Fletcher, Tales of The City, Nashville
  • Janet Mock
    Key Cast
    POSE
  • Project Type:
    Documentary
  • Runtime:
    1 hour 50 minutes
  • Completion Date:
    November 30, 2019
  • Production Budget:
    970,000 USD
  • Country of Origin:
    United States
  • Country of Filming:
    United States
  • Language:
    English
  • Shooting Format:
    HD 4K
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    No
  • Student Project:
    No
Distribution Information
  • Submarine is representing Disclosure
Director Biography - Sam Feder

Sam Feder has created several award-winning documentaries that center the intersections of race, class, sexuality, and conflict within the queer and trans community. Sam seeks to connect transgender struggles and liberation to the context of the present and legacy of the past. Sam’s second feature Kate Bornstein is a Queer & Pleasant Danger was named one of the best LGBT documentaries of 2014 by The Advocate, and cited by IndieWire as one of the must-see films of the 2014. Sam has been awarded the James Aronson Award for Social Justice Journalism, multiple international best feature film awards and residencies including The Jerome Foundation, Frameline Completion Fund, Astraea Foundation for Social Justice, The MacDowell Colony, and Yaddo Artist Residency.

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Director Statement

I have been making documentaries about and from within the trans community for many years. It’s only been recently, however, that a mainstream audience has taken an interest in this subject matter, and most nonfiction work about trans people continues to be created by non trans makers. I decided to make a film about this pivotal time—and the history of representation which informs it—from a trans point of view. By centering trans experience, Disclosure will shed light on a current public debate, which has put the rights and lives of trans people in doubt.

Trans people are more visible than ever before. It’s a thrilling result of decades of art, activism, and political lobbying. The increasing visibility of transgender representation is exhilarating, and signals the beginnings of positive social change. Nevertheless, hate-motivated violence against trans people has increased, and suicide rates among transgender people are among the highest of any demographic group. There has been a surge of efforts to constrain transgender civil rights. From current “bathroom bills,” which paint trans women as male predators, to a Presidential military ban on trans service, there is an attempt to exclude trans people from public life. Using history to illuminate the present, Disclosure unpacks and explores the origins of fearing trans people.
Disclosure shows audiences that decades-old stereotypes, memes, and tropes in the media both form and reflect our understanding of trans people and have shaped the cultural narrative about transgender issues, which inform everything from dating and domestic violence, to school policy and national legislation. Since 80% of the population in the United States have never met a transgender person, all they know is rooted in media depictions, which are predominantly horrific and rarely include the participation by actual trans people. Disclosure is aimed at that 80%.
As a trans artist and activist, with access to the leading thinkers and creators of trans media today, I am the right person to weave these voices together in a way that confronts, explores, challenges, and complicates the story.