Neither Saints nor Sinners

With Adam Piron, Heidi Saman, Kevin Jerome Everson, Rachael Abigail Holder; moderated by Meg Onli

We all have stories to tell — some mythical and futuristic, and some, well, ordinary. Filmmakers of color often face pressure to create extraordinary characters that fulfill unrealistic, stereotypical tropes. But what about the telling of “regular” stories that examine the lives and psyches of characters of color? We can’t, nor need we, all be geniuses, saviors, or criminals. The title of this panel is borrowed from a master class given by filmmaker and author Kathleen Collins in 1984 at Howard University, in which she said, “I refuse to create mythological characters.” In this conversation, we will hear from filmmakers who have told grounded, human stories and the challenges they faced producing and distributing films rooted in the beauty and complexity of the ordinary.