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| Some of the doctors who feature in Black Women In Medicine Photo: Crystal Emery |
Crystal Emery, founder of social justice focused production company URU: The Right To Be and director of The Deadliest Disease In America, which focuses on racism in medicine, wasn't looking to make another documentary when, on routine hospital visits, she encountered doctors who didn't fit the stereotype associated with the profession. It happened, she says, "By God's grace. I was not looking to do a film about black women, but I met these women and I felt that their story should be told."
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| Crystal Emery, producer, writer and director of Black Women In Medicine Photo: BWIM |
That story would become Black Women In Medicine, which has its television première on American Public Television's World Channel on February 8. The story behind it is equally fascinating. Crystal was optimistic when she started out, confident that other people would recognise the importance of the subject. She was, she says, "not prepared for the pushback, for the level of resistance I encountered. What that showed me was that black women are really not valued in our society." But Crystal is not the sort of person who gives up easily, and she persevered, though it took her five years and $800,000.
She reflects on another recent film. "Hidden Figures was just released doing so well at the box office and if makes me wonder, did they receive the same kind of pushback that I did?" She puts its success down to its celebrity cast. Getting attention to a documentary is a different kind of challenge.
Even finding her subjects was tough. "I did it the hard way, by word of mouth... I interviewed 45 women before I chose 12. It was a very organic unfolding. When you do a documentary you never know what the subjects are going to bring to the table, so you have to meet them and hear their stories, then see what your heart feels. Developing the film from those initial components is definitely a heart thing."
With a strong personal commitment to inspiring social change, Crystal focused much of her attention on ensuring that the film targeted the right audience, because she wanted it to be more than just a viewing experience - she wanted it to do something. Her efforts seem to have paid off.
"I met a doctor that came to the film and asked for copies because he wanted to share them with colleagues, and he said 'I know black doctors but I have never had a conversation with them or even heard them mention racism in medicine.' He said his practice is in the suburbs but it’s not like he chose not to go to the inner city - that was the one that was available when he graduated. He said that what the film did was it made him realise how privileged he was. So I said to him ‘Okay, so now you know. What are you do about it?’ and he said ‘I’m going to mentor some students at medical school and offer my services to support a person of colour’ And that’s what I had hoped the outcome would look like."
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| Doctor Lisa Cooper with a patient Photo: Crystal Emery |
As a disabled person myself, I know something of the difficulties involved in making a film when faced with extra physical limitations - difficulties that have a lot to do with the attitudes of other people. Crystal is quadriplegic. What difficulties did that raise for her when making Black Women In Medicine?
"I think being quadriplegic is difficult in general!" she exclaims. "It is exhausting being differently abled. So it cost more to travel, to rent a hospital bed, to take a nursing assistant, but creativity of the spirit – when we go to that space it transcends all limitations. I was on set every day as producer, director and writer, and my body got ticked off a little bit. I was working 12 hour days but it was only for a short time. Then when the film opened in New York I couldn’t see it because the theatre had no wheelchair access. I want to stress that I'm not making a judgement on the theatre. They had adapted rail type lifts for a manual chair but I have an electric chair and it was too heavy. So there I am at one of the greatest moments in a filmmaker’s life, getting a theatrical release, and I can’t see my own film."
It's a difficult one, but getting the screening in that location was otherwise something of a coup, so she didn't let it get to her. She had to balance her own desire to see the film with an audience against making sure the world would get to see it. But some reactions from members of the public reflected what she'd had to deal with during the filmmaking process.
"People said ‘You can’t do this. What makes you think you can make this film?’ In meetings they would talk to my assistant like I’m not there and my assistant knows nothing about film or anything. I was constantly disrespected. After a screening in Los Angeles I Skyped in to do a talk and one of the people in the audience said ‘What did you do?’ I said ‘I produced, directed and wrote this film,’ and she said ‘How could you do all of that?’ I said ‘Lady, you just sat and watched a film about the triumph of the human spirit. What film did you see?’"
I mention a conversation I had with Desiree Akhavan a couple of years ago in which we discussed the difficulty she'd had getting funding to address sexuality and ethnicity in a single film. Did making a film about black women, as a disabled person, throw up the same issues?
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| Dr Aletha Maybank, Deputy Commissioner of the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene |
"The film world does not do multiple issues in general. It’s nothing to do with black woman, disabled people of anything – they have a format that they have decided sells," says Crystal. "If look at it as the intersection of race, gender and disability, I don’t exist in the world. I am not seen. As a filmmaker, I am not seen. As a person in a wheelchair, I am not even considered. When I come into a room people don’t know how to take it, so they go to the no zone. I’m neither a circle nor a square... I never know which issue is at work, but here’s the thing: I know who I am. I really don’t care about your limitations. I'm not gong to let them decide my experience so I don’t go into the room expecting acceptance or not acceptance, I go into the room with my agenda very clear and I let it unfold from there."
Alongside the film, Crystal has published a book with the same title. "It developed out of the process of making the film," she explains. "One day when I was looking for PR stills I realised I had all these beautiful pictures. And you know how it is making a documentary - I had a lot more interview material. You maybe use five minutes out of an hour and a half long interview, so I said 'Let’s make a book.' Originally the film was going to address the historical context but later I moved a little away from that so the history is in the book. Then at the end when I looked at the book I felt there was something missing, and it was the future. So I dressed up little girls as doctors. Because you can’t be what you can’t see."
Crystal is now working on another book, a love story called Without A Trace. The film is on tour and she's looking forward to it screening at the Pan African Film Festival. "We are all spirit in motion, energy in motion," she says, and we should never let labels or our limitations define us.
