American Academy Film Screening

Every Body

Filmmaker Julie Cohen’s new documentary Every Body is the moving story of three intersex individuals: actor and screenwriter River Gallo, political consultant Alicia Roth Weigel, and PhD student Sean Saifa Wall. Through their stories, Cohen offers a view into the lives of these three protagonists – from a childhood of shame and non-consensual intimacy to reclaiming their bodies and lives. An estimated 1.7% of people are considered to be intersexual – meaning they were born with an anatomical difference that does not align with either male or female, as dictated by traditional definitions of sex. Every Body shines a light on the complexity of intersexuality and the ways medicine and culture have historically denied this complexity by insisting on the existence of only two sexes.

Every Body first premiered at the 2023 Tribeca Film Festival and is one of the very few films to explore the complexity of the intersex experience. In an era in which bodily autonomy is being threatened and the queer community is facing cultural erasure by conservative voices, Every Body is “a monumental statement that traces the history of intersex awareness in America.”

Director Julie Cohen will be in attendance and answer audience questions after the screening.