Groundbreaking Documentary Film Spotlights Women in Straight Marriages who Came Out as Lesbians and Changed Their Lives

SPEAK YOUR TRUTH, a documentary film about personal awareness and sexual liberation, will have its commercial premiere at New York City’s Anthology Film Archives on March 8th, following its success at film festivals including ImageOut: The Rochester LGBT Festival. Directed by first-time filmmaker Kris Erickson, the feature-length film profiles nine women who were in heterosexual marriages when they discovered their identities as lesbians and made the difficult decision to “speak their truth” and change their lives, often over the objections of their spouses, parents, children and churches.
“I lived a ‘speak your truth’ story, married with three children,” said Erickson, “and when I came out as gay I met many women who had their own poignant, difficult and fascinating journeys. In some ways, the details of our stories may have differed, but we were all united by the powerful emotions of discovery, denial, acceptance, rejection and courage that are now depicted in the film through the telling of these deeply personal portraits.”
Erickson and many of the women in the film were initially brought together by their participation in a support group led by Joanne Fleisher, a therapist with an expertise in the experience of lesbians who come out after marrying a man, and whose book, Living Two Lives, was one of the first to examine the subject. “As people mature through their lives, they become more aware of their authentic selves. For the women in the film, they had to be willing to act on that awareness in order to live honest lives.”
Filmed in New York and Philadelphia, the film’s subjects include broadcasters Michele Musso and Jennifer Ariemma, whose on-camera interviews were conducted by Alana DiMaria.
Speak Your Truth will premiere at the Anthology Film Archives on March 8th at 6:30 p.m. A Q and A with some of the women featured in the film will follow. After event party : TBD