Photos: LAVENDER MEN Premieres At Micheaux Film Festival

On Saturday, October 26, Lavender Men, a new film directed by Lovell Holder and written by Holder and Roger Q. Mason based on Mason’s critically acclaimed stage play, premiered at the Micheaux Film Festival in Los Angeles, CA at the Culver Theater. See photos here! 

The cast features Roger Q. Mason (Outstanding: A Comedy Revolution on Netflix) as Taffeta, Pete Ploszek (Michael Bay’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise; the upcoming final season of You on Netflix) as Abe, and Alex Esola (Bart Freundlich’s After the Wedding at Sundance; The Young Pope on HBO) as Elmer. The supporting cast includes Philippe Bowgen, Chad Callaghan, Linnea Liu Dakin, Natasha Dewhurst, Mia Ellis, Cherie Corinne Rice, Ted Rooney, Charlie Thurston, Tyler Woehl, and Gillian Williams. Lavender Men was produced by Mia Chang, Mia Ellis, Lovell Holder, and Roger Q. Mason with Executive Producers Rob Massar, Christopher Donaldson, Paul Hart-Wilden, Gary Grossman, Jon Lawrence Rivera, and Cece Suazo, Co-Executive Producers Gillian Williams and Matt Plaxco, Co-Producer Shirley Luong, and Associate Producers Letitia Chang and Seth Dorcey. The production team included Director of Photography Matt Plaxco, Editor Morgan Halsey, Production Designer Stephen Gifford, Composer David Gonzalez, Original Song “I Am a Chandelier!” by Kevin JZ Prodigy, Choreographer Jobel Medina, Vogue Choreographer Cece Suazo, Intimacy Coordinator Talya Klein, Original Theatrical Intimacy Coordinator Ann C. James, Theatrical Lighting Consultant Dan Weingarten, Theatrical Costume Consultant Wendell Carmichael, Theatrical Sound Consultant Erin Bednarz, and Headdress and Jewelry Design by ONCH.

While working on a poorly-attended play about Abraham Lincoln, the long-suffering stage manager Taffeta interfaces with difficult people both onstage and off.  After a particularly miserable performance, Taffeta plunges into their daydreams, crafting their own retelling of the Lincoln myth by inserting themself into the likely true love story between Abe – then just a young lawyer in Springfield, Illinois – and Elmer Ellsworth, a dashing young army sergeant.  As Taffeta churns through every possible identity to bring themselves as close to connection and intimacy as they can, they must question why they have chosen to tell a tale that may never have been for them in the first place – and how to finally live a life of their very own. Part chamber drama and part exorcism, Lavender Men presents a fundamentally queer story where theater, cinema, history, and memoir collide into one singular, breathtaking fantasia.

Photo credit: Seth Dorcey 

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