THE GIRLS IN THE BAND Comes to Lincoln Center in May

The Girls in the Band is a documentary about female jazz and big band instrumentalists that chronicles their inspired journeys and struggles for recognition from the late 1920s to the present day. The film will be screening for one week beginning May 10 at the Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center at Lincoln Center. Written and directed by Judy Chaikin and executive produced by Michael Greene, who are also the film's producers, The Girls in the Band is being hailed as a "real crowd-pleaser" by Variety and "extraordinary" by The Hollywood Reporter. The film won the Audience Choice Awards at the Palm Springs Film Festival, the Victoria Film Festival and the Omaha Film Festival as well as the Best Music Documentary Award at DocUtah Film Festival. The film has also screened at many other festivals including the Atlanta Film Festival, the Dubai International Film Festival, the Cleveland International Film Festival and the Washington D.C. International Film Festival. Screen Daily International declared The Girls in the Band to be "a fascinating, moving and wonderfully tuneful documentary." More info on the film can be found at the film's website: http://www.thegirlsintheband.com/home/.

The Lincoln Center screening is hosted in part by the WAM Coalition and New York Women in Film and Television with support from artists and the New York business and cultural community including Woody Allen, Herb Alpert, Mercedes Ellington, Renée Fleming,Wynton Marsalis, Bette Midler, Maria Schneider and Jonathan Tisch. The host committee chair is Ann Ziff, Chairman of the Metropolitan Opera.

Combining archival footage and interviews with musicians including drummer Viola Smith, saxophonists Roz Cron, bassist Carline Ray and trumpeter Clora Bryant, Chaikin explores how even in the face of extreme prejudice, sexism and racism these women helped shape the history of American music and bravely challenged the racial barriers that prevenTEd White and black musicians from working together. The film also reveals how female jazz musicians of today, including Maria Schneider, Anat Cohen, Sherrie Maricle and Esperanza Spalding, are continuing to build upon the talent and courage of their predecessors.

Judy Chaikin, a graduate of AFI's Directing Workshop for Women, first came to recognition when she wrote, produced and directed the 1987 Emmy-nominated PBS documentary Legacy of the Hollywood Blacklist. In 2004 she received her second Emmy nomination for the documentary Building on a Dream. Chaikin has also worked on the ABC series "FBI: The Untold Stories," the CBS Movie of the WeekStolen Innocence and the PBS documentary Los Pastores. Michael Greene is President and CEO of Artist Tribe and previously served for 15 years as the President/CEO of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences (GRAMMY AWARDS) where he founded the Grammy Educational Foundation and The Musicares Foundation, providing financial grants and assistance to music professionals in need.