NEW DAY FILMS BY
Debra Chasnoff:

Deadly Deception: General Electric, Nuclear Weapons, and Our Environment

Homes & Hands: Community Land Trusts in Action

It's Elementary: Talking About Gay Issues in School

Let's Get Real

One Wedding and a Revolution

That's a Family!

Producer's Web Site:
www.groundspark.org

Debra Chasnoff is an Academy Award-winning documentary filmmaker whose work has fueled progressive social-change movements in many fields. She is a the executive director at GroundSpark, formerly Women's Educational Media, and co-creator of The Respect for All Project, a program that produces media and training resources to help prevent prejudice among young people.

Her Respect for All films include: Let's Get Real (2003; director/producer), a powerful documentary about young teens' experiences with name-calling and bullying in which youth speak up about racial tensions, anti-gay taunting, sexual harassment and much more; That's a Family! (2000; director/producer), which looks at family diversity from a kids' perspective, and was screened at the (Clinton!) White House and been embraced by scores of national children's advocacy, education and civil-rights organizations; and It's Elementary -Talking About Gay Issues in School (1996; director/producer), which was hailed as "a model of intelligent directing" by International Documentary and has served as a catalyst for schools all over the world to become more proactive in addressing anti-gay prejudice in the classroom.

In 2007, Chasnoff directed It's STILL Elementary, a retrospective look at why It's Elementary was originally produced, the response it drew from the conservative right, and the impact the film has had on the national safe schools movement and some of the original students who appeared in the film.

Chasnoff's other film credits include the Oscar-winning Deadly Deception-General Electric, Nuclear Weapons & Our Environment (1991; director/producer), a crucial component of a successful international grassroots campaign to pressure GE out of the nuclear-weapons industry; Homes & HandsCommunity Land Trusts in Action (1998; co-director), which is used extensively to inspire local communities to explore new models of creating permanently affordable housing; Wired for What? (1999; director/producer), part of the PBS series Digital Divide about the push to computerize education; Choosing Children (1984; director/producer), which explored the once seemingly impossible idea that lesbians and gay men could become parents; One Wedding and a Revolution (2004:Director/Co-producer), captures the frantic days leading up to the bold political decision of San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom to start issuing marriage licenses to gay and lesbian couples.

Chasnoff serves on the national advisory board for Frameline, the San Francisco International Lesbian and Gay Film Festival, and Jewish Voices for Peace. She is a graduate of Wellesley College and lives in San Francisco and has two sons, who have been the inspiration for many of her films.

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