Directed by: Kathryn L Beranich | 62 min | United States
In the 1980's, a group calling itself First Friday sprung fully formed from the imaginations of a group of lesbians living in the small city of Roanoke, Virginia. Some of the women were locals and some moved to the Roanoke Valley for employment. It was the Reagan era and homosexuals were vilified, especially in the Bible Belt. Spurred on by the pure serendipity of finding each other, the group created safe space, threw fantastic events and grew a community of lasting friendships, all in the shadow of the Moral Majority.
This little slice of lesbian history is told through the voices and anecdotes of First Friday members and the women who joined in the fun.
Directed by: Max Westerman | 60 min | Netherlands
Among the first to be hit by the AIDS epidemic in the 1980’s, Sean Strub’s political ambitions took a backseat as he struggled to survive. Now 60, he is running for mayor of a conservative town in Pennsylvania. How will this liberal, openly gay ex-New Yorker and founder of POZ, a magazine for people with HIV, fare in a rural community that voted for Donald Trump? My Friend, The Mayor follows his two-month campaign through to its nail-biting finish. The documentary, filmed by Sean’s friend and former Dutch TV-correspondent Max Westerman, is an inspiring and hopeful portrayal of small-town democracy in the age of Trump. The election of a controversial president has energized voters at the local level, with many getting involved in surprisingly bipartisan ways.
