Ep. 166: No One Asked You Documentary with Director Ruth Leitman

Ep. 166: No One Asked You Documentary with Director Ruth Leitman

I had the pleasure of interviewing Ruth Leitman. I was a huge fan of her documentary “Wildwood, N.J and it was an honor to chat with her in general. This documentary really opened my mind to the bad historical realities of the fight for the right to have abortions. The doc offers an important history lesson overall and especially in the past years on the fight to keep abortion legal. Ruth is an intelligent and thoughtful filmmaker and directing an amazing documentary. See link below to rent the film for $10!

About the Film

Comedian, disruptor-extraordinaire Lizz Winstead (co-creator of The Daily Show), and Abortion Access Front crisscross the U.S. to support abortion clinic staff and bust stigma. Pop culture icons and next-gen comics fuel this six-year road film activating small-town folks to rebuild vandalized clinics, exposing wrongdoer politicians, anti-abortion extremists, and media neglect as the race to the bottom ensues and our rights burn down.

No One Asked You is a bold call to action driven by the power of humor in social change, where joy prevails. 

About Ruth Leitman

Ruth Leitman has a BFA in Film and Photography from University of the Arts in Philadelphia. Through her company Ruthless Films, Ruth Leitman has directed six feature documentaries. Her films focus on women and those whose lives have faced a lack of opportunity, but who are survivors. Her work has received funding from Rockefeller Foundation, TriBeCa Film Institute, Paul Robeson Fund, Illinois Humanities Council and Fledgling Fund. In 2020 she was awarded the 2020 City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs Esteemed Artist in Film and Media. Her Southern Gothic film Alma (1998) won the Documentary Feature Jury Prize at Hamptons Film Festival, screened at International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam, SXSW, Director’s Guild of America and the Whitney Biennial. Premiering at Tribeca Film Festival and Hot Docs, her film Lipstick & Dynamite(2005) won the Documentary Storytelling Prize at Nantucket Film Festival; was released theatrically; and was broadcast on SHOWTIME. Lipstick was featured on Jay Leno, Conan O’Brien and NPR’s Fresh Air and Morning Edition.

In summer 2009, Leitman’s first documentary Wildwood, NJ. (1994) became a youtube viral hit, featured on hundreds of best of year-end lists and blogs including Jezebel, Urban Outfitters, G4’s Attack of the Show, and VH-1’s Best Week Ever. The film became a symbol of ‘90’s zeitgeist girl culture, and was appropriated for pop culture media from the music videos of Lana Del Rey to the fashion runways of Milan. Wildwood was invited to screen at Hot Doc’s fifteen-year anniversary festival in 2013 and featured in British Film Institute, Sight and Sound Magazine’s- The Female Gaze: 100 Overlooked Films Directed by Women, which sparked a tour of the UK in summer 2016

Tony & Janina’s American Wedding(2010), an immigration story, premiered at The Chicago International Film Festival, winning a Jury Prize and became a clear agent for change and a NY Times International breaking news story when the family in the film was reunited in the US.

She was a director on the Kartemquin Films produced series Hard Earned for Al Jazeera America, which was nominated for an International Documentary Association Award and won the Alfred I. duPont Columbia Journalism Award in 2016.

http://ruthlessfilms.com

https://www.nooneaskedyoudoc.com

Film Rental Link ($10)

https://kinema.com/films/no-one-asked-you-2tzljh

Credits

Stephen Bluhm - Sound Engineer

⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.stephenbluhm.fun⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

Rich Wexler

Producer/Interviewer

⁠⁠⁠http://www.vintageannalsarchive.com

Episode Editors

Otter Castro

Rudy Fischmann