Sure, HBO series “The Deuce” may have piqued some interest in the history of classic porn cinema, but now the outrageous true story of Times Square staple Chelly Wilson is getting the spotlight.
Documentary “Queen of the Deuce” centers on Wilson’s personal history before building a porn theater in the notorious Times Square vicinity known as the Deuce. Wilson’s reign ranged from the late ’60s to the mid-’80s as she earned a reputation as one of the savviest and most enigmatic figures on the scene.
Greek-born Wilson escaped the Holocaust in WWII, emigrated to the U.S., and married a slew of men while being openly gay. Her legacy in the world of adult cinema is examined by filmmaker Valerie Kontakos (“Mana”), who has written, directed, and produced the documentary.
“Queen of the Deuce” is further produced by Ed Barreveld and Despina Pavlaki, who also co-wrote the...
Documentary “Queen of the Deuce” centers on Wilson’s personal history before building a porn theater in the notorious Times Square vicinity known as the Deuce. Wilson’s reign ranged from the late ’60s to the mid-’80s as she earned a reputation as one of the savviest and most enigmatic figures on the scene.
Greek-born Wilson escaped the Holocaust in WWII, emigrated to the U.S., and married a slew of men while being openly gay. Her legacy in the world of adult cinema is examined by filmmaker Valerie Kontakos (“Mana”), who has written, directed, and produced the documentary.
“Queen of the Deuce” is further produced by Ed Barreveld and Despina Pavlaki, who also co-wrote the...
- 4/18/2024
- by Samantha Bergeson
- Indiewire
Ed Barreveld, an European Film Market (EFM) veteran, is returning to Berlin via his Storyline Entertainment banner, having sold its feature documentaries to CBC, PBS, Discovery, NatGeo, Sky UK, Zdf and Arte, among others.
With 35 years of experience in the doc space, Barreveld specializes in combining Canadian and international storytellers, financiers and distributors on factual features that explore hidden places and issues in society and culture.
His award-winning producer credits include Angad Bhalla’s Herman’s House, about Herman Wallace, a prisoner in a solitary cell in Louisiana’s “Angola” prison where he draws his dream house; Nisha Pahuja’s The World Before Her, about women competing in the Miss India pageant; and Min Sook-Lee’s Tiger Spirit, which captures a family reunion across the Korean Demilitarized Zone.
Before touching down in Berlin, Barreveld told The Hollywood Reporter about what he’s looking forward to, and aiming to avoid, at the EFM.
With 35 years of experience in the doc space, Barreveld specializes in combining Canadian and international storytellers, financiers and distributors on factual features that explore hidden places and issues in society and culture.
His award-winning producer credits include Angad Bhalla’s Herman’s House, about Herman Wallace, a prisoner in a solitary cell in Louisiana’s “Angola” prison where he draws his dream house; Nisha Pahuja’s The World Before Her, about women competing in the Miss India pageant; and Min Sook-Lee’s Tiger Spirit, which captures a family reunion across the Korean Demilitarized Zone.
Before touching down in Berlin, Barreveld told The Hollywood Reporter about what he’s looking forward to, and aiming to avoid, at the EFM.
- 2/16/2024
- by Etan Vlessing
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Cinephil has sold Valerie Kontakos’ documentary “Queen of the Deuce,” which charts the rise of Chelly Wilson, the queen of the porn industry in 1970s New York, to several key territories. The film premiered at Doc NYC and is now playing in the International Competition at the Thessaloniki Intl. Documentary Festival.
Greece’s Ert, Canada’s Doc Channel, Switzerland’s Radio Télévision Suisse and Israel’s Channel 8 came on board at the funding stage. It has now been acquired by Spanish streamer FilmIn, Swedish broadcaster Ur, and U.S. theatrical distributor Greenwich Entertainment.
The film follows Wilson from pre-World War II Greece to New York, where she rose to become a major figure on the porn circuit in Times Square from the late 1960s to the mid 1980s. She is shown to be a trailblazing, taboo-breaking entrepreneur and an unconventional matriarch. It is presented as an empowering story of survival,...
Greece’s Ert, Canada’s Doc Channel, Switzerland’s Radio Télévision Suisse and Israel’s Channel 8 came on board at the funding stage. It has now been acquired by Spanish streamer FilmIn, Swedish broadcaster Ur, and U.S. theatrical distributor Greenwich Entertainment.
The film follows Wilson from pre-World War II Greece to New York, where she rose to become a major figure on the porn circuit in Times Square from the late 1960s to the mid 1980s. She is shown to be a trailblazing, taboo-breaking entrepreneur and an unconventional matriarch. It is presented as an empowering story of survival,...
- 3/11/2023
- by Tara Karajica
- Variety Film + TV
In Valerie Kontakos’ fourth feature, “The Queen of the Deuce,” the New York native, Athens-based director and NYU Tisch School of the Arts alumna, gives an alternate take on cultural history as seen through the eyes of Chelly Wilson, queen of the porno industry in 1970s New York and unconventional feminist, against the backdrop of the rise of feminism, the sexual revolution and gay pride. The film plays in the International Competition at the Thessaloniki Intl. Documentary Festival.
Kontakos says she knew Wilson through her mother, whose brother was a producer of Greek films who, in the ‘60s and ‘70s, would provide Wilson with Greek family films for her Sunday programs. “When I turned 15 or 16, I said to [my mother]: ‘Now that I can work part time, I am going to get myself a job because I want to start making my own money and I want to be independent.’ And,...
Kontakos says she knew Wilson through her mother, whose brother was a producer of Greek films who, in the ‘60s and ‘70s, would provide Wilson with Greek family films for her Sunday programs. “When I turned 15 or 16, I said to [my mother]: ‘Now that I can work part time, I am going to get myself a job because I want to start making my own money and I want to be independent.’ And,...
- 3/7/2023
- by Tara Karajica
- Variety Film + TV
It’s been a couple months since the last edition of What’s Up Doc? placed Michael Moore’s surprise world premiere of Where To Invade Next at the top of this list and in the meantime much shuffling has taken place and much time has been spent on various new endeavors (namely my Buffalo-based film series, Cultivate Cinema Circle). Finally taking its rightful place at the top, D.A. Pennebaker and Chris Hagedus’ Unlocking the Cage is in the midst of being scored by composer James Lavino, according to Lavino’s own personal site. Though the project has been taking shape at its own leisurely pace, I’d expect to see the film making its festival debut in early 2016.
Right behind, the American direct cinema masters is a Texan soon to make his non-fiction debut with Voyage of Time. Just two weeks ago indieWIRE reported that Ennio Morricone, who scored...
Right behind, the American direct cinema masters is a Texan soon to make his non-fiction debut with Voyage of Time. Just two weeks ago indieWIRE reported that Ennio Morricone, who scored...
- 11/5/2015
- by Jordan M. Smith
- IONCINEMA.com
It should come as no surprise that Cannes Film Festival will play host to Kent Jones’s doc on the touchstone of filmmaking interview tomes, Hitchcock/Truffaut (see photo above). The film has been floating near the top of this list since it was announced last year as in development, while Jones himself has a history with the festival, having co-written both Arnaud Desplechin’s Jimmy P. and Martin Scorsese’s My Voyage To Italy, both of which premiered in Cannes. The film is scheduled to screen as part of the Cannes Classics sidebar alongside the likes of Stig Björkman’s Ingrid Bergman, in Her Own Words, which will play as part of the festival’s tribute to the late starlet, and Gabriel Clarke and John McKenna’s Steve McQueen: The Man & Le Mans (see trailer below). As someone who grew up watching road races with my dad in Watkins Glen,...
- 5/1/2015
- by Jordan M. Smith
- IONCINEMA.com
Now that the busy winter fest schedule of Sundance, Rotterdam and the Berlinale has concluded, we’ve now got our eyes on the likes of True/False and SXSW. While, True/False does not specialize in attention grabbing world premieres, it does provide a late winter haven for cream of the crop non-fiction fare from all the previously mentioned fests and a selection of overlooked genre blending films presented in a down home setting. This year will mark my first trip to the Columbia, Missouri based fest, where I hope to catch a little of everything, from their hush-hush secret screenings, to selections from their Neither/Nor series, this year featuring chimeric Polish cinema of decades past, to a spotlight of Adam Curtis’s incisive oeuvre. But truth be told, it is SXSW, with its slew of high profile world premieres being announced, such as Alex Gibney’s Steve Jobs...
- 2/27/2015
- by Jordan M. Smith
- IONCINEMA.com
India-born, Toronto-bred Nisha Pahuja’s beautiful and poignant The World Before Her won the World Documentary Competition Award at Tribeca Film Festival, where it premiered a few weeks ago. And while Pahuja grew up and lives in Toronto, she still has a fascination for her homeland. The World Before Her is her third film, after Diamond Road and Bollywood Bound, and her second dealing with India. It presents two sides of the country. For one segment of the film, Pahuja’s crew follows 20 “Miss India” contestants as they endure the pageant’s controversial month-long training regimen. The audience accompanies the women on every step of this boot camp, from Botox injection sessions to photo shoots. Pahuja focuses on three pageant hopefuls who are living a dream but who are also pushed into a new world and taken away from the patriarchal society they know. Ruhi is one of the competitors...
- 6/14/2012
- by Leopoldine Huyghues Despointes
- Filmmaker Magazine - Blog
Hot Docs has announced the winners of the festival's 2012 awards, with Nisha Pahuja's "The World Before Her" and Malika Zouhali-Worrall and Katherine Fairfax Wright's "Call Me Kuchu" taking top prizes in the Canadian and international categories, respectively. The ceremony took place at the Windsor Arms Hotel in Toronto last night. Ten awards and $71,000 in cash prizes were presented to filmmakers. The award for Best Canadian Feature was presented to The World Before Her (D: Nisha Pahuja; P: Cornelia Principe, Nisha Pahuja, Ed Barreveld), a look at the clash between modernity and tradition faced by young women in India. Sponsored by the Documentary Organization of Canada, the award includes a $10,000 prize courtesy of Hot Docs. “For its brave and provocative exploration of the role of women at its two extremes in contemporary Indian society, the jury recognizes the exceptional storytelling of The World Before Her," the...
- 5/5/2012
- by Peter Knegt
- Indiewire
Documentaries, especially feature length ones are becoming harder and harder to finance. This one took a very long time. Normally the process is– we find a key Canadian broadcaster and then work our way around the globe. But the Canadian doc industry has been hit hard and most broadcasters were not able to get involved.
The World Before Her, a documentary by Indo-Canadian filmmaker Nisha Pahuja opens the World Documentary Competition at the
Still from The World Before Her
11th Tribeca Film Festival in April. The film portrays the situation of contemporary women in India, drawing parallels between those nurtured in modern vis-à-vis traditional cultures. It follows the journey of girls participating in the Miss India pageant in contrast with girls in a camp of Durga Vahini, the women’s wing of Vishva Hindu Parishad. Nisha Pahuja talks about her experiences and discoveries while making this film:
What was the idea you started out with?...
The World Before Her, a documentary by Indo-Canadian filmmaker Nisha Pahuja opens the World Documentary Competition at the
Still from The World Before Her
11th Tribeca Film Festival in April. The film portrays the situation of contemporary women in India, drawing parallels between those nurtured in modern vis-à-vis traditional cultures. It follows the journey of girls participating in the Miss India pageant in contrast with girls in a camp of Durga Vahini, the women’s wing of Vishva Hindu Parishad. Nisha Pahuja talks about her experiences and discoveries while making this film:
What was the idea you started out with?...
- 3/27/2012
- by Nandita Dutta
- DearCinema.com
This week Tribeca has announced the opening of this year’s World Documentary Competition: The World Before Her
directed by Nisha Pahuja. Making it’s world premiere, The World Before Her subjects the “culture clash between beauty pageantry and Hindu religious extremism.” The film earned Toronto’s Storyline Entertainment the distinctive opening spot of the World Documentary Competition at the Tribeca Film Festival on Thursday April 19, 2012 and the Festival will run through April 29. Read below for the official press release from Tribeca:
(Toronto – March 6, 2012) A vivid portrayal of culture clash between beauty pageantry and Hindu religious extremism, The World Before Her has earned Toronto’s Storyline Entertainment the distinctive opening spot of the World Documentary Competition at the Tribeca Film Festival on Thursday April 19, 2012, which will be the film’s World Premiere.
Via unprecedented access, The World Before Her contrasts the wide-eyed ambitions of 20 hand-picked contestants determined to win the Miss India pageant,...
directed by Nisha Pahuja. Making it’s world premiere, The World Before Her subjects the “culture clash between beauty pageantry and Hindu religious extremism.” The film earned Toronto’s Storyline Entertainment the distinctive opening spot of the World Documentary Competition at the Tribeca Film Festival on Thursday April 19, 2012 and the Festival will run through April 29. Read below for the official press release from Tribeca:
(Toronto – March 6, 2012) A vivid portrayal of culture clash between beauty pageantry and Hindu religious extremism, The World Before Her has earned Toronto’s Storyline Entertainment the distinctive opening spot of the World Documentary Competition at the Tribeca Film Festival on Thursday April 19, 2012, which will be the film’s World Premiere.
Via unprecedented access, The World Before Her contrasts the wide-eyed ambitions of 20 hand-picked contestants determined to win the Miss India pageant,...
- 3/9/2012
- by Christopher Clemente
- SoundOnSight
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