SCCI Cinema Club presents: Cheryl Dunye’s The Watermelon Woman

The School for the Creative and Cultural Industries is delighted to present the latest screening of the SCCI Cinema Club in collaboration with National Student Pride, the UCL Department of Information Studies and UCL's Centre for Critical Archives & Records Management Studies. Taking place at the One Pool Street Cinema at UCL East, we will be hosting a series of free screenings, sharing the films that have inspired and influenced researchers, artists, and practitioners across our creative community.  

Lucy Brownson, Lecturer in Archives and Records Management and tutor on Information in Society BSc, has selected The Watermelon Woman directed by and starring Cheryl Dunye.

Lucy says:

“The Watermelon Woman is genre-bending in multiple ways, combining humour, elements of (auto)biography, critical fabulation and mockumentary to interrogate the marginalisation of queer Black women and women of colour in both cinema history and archival organisations (even those labouring under the banner of ‘community’). In so doing, it asks vital questions about representational and reparatory work within and beyond archives, about who gets to do the work of making histories and worlds, and about who is forcibly placed in the margins.

To mark LGBT+ History Month, I’ve selected this film because it reckons with the limitations and possibilities of queer and feminist archival work, something which has deeply influenced my own practice as a community archivist and educator.”

The Watermelon Woman will be screened at 6.30pm and introduced by Lucy Brownson. Doors open at 6pm, please aim to be seated by 6.15pm at the latest. Bring your friends, family and colleagues – all are welcome.

Please note this film has an age rating of 15.

About the film

Set in Philadelphia, The Watermelon Woman is the story of Cheryl (Cheryl Dunye), a twentysomething black lesbian struggling to make a documentary about Fae Richards. Fae is a beautiful and elusive 1930s black film actress, who appears in unnamed and racially stereotyped roles in 1930s classical Hollywood cinema, popularly known as “The Watermelon Woman”

While uncovering the meaning of Fae Richards’ life, Cheryl experiences a total upheaval in her personal life. Her love affair with Diana (Guinevere Turner), a beautiful white woman, and her interactions with the gay and black communities are subject to the comic yet biting criticism of her best friend Tamara (Valarie Walker). Meanwhile, each answer Cheryl discovers about the Watermelon Woman evokes a flurry of new questions about herself and her future. At the film’s conclusion, The Watermelon Woman is clearly a metaphor for Cheryl’s search for identity, community, and love.

Running time: 81 mins
Age rating: 15. This film contains strong language, mild drug use, scenes of nudity and moderate sex references.
Year: 1997
Director: Cheryl Dunye
Producers: Barry Swimar, Alexandra Juhasz
Cast: Cheryl Dunye, Guinevere Turner, Valerie Walker, Lisa Marie Bronson, Camille Paglia, Toshi Reagon, Cheryl Clarke, Sarah Schulman

“…layered with intelligent ideas about the complexities of power and love…” Time Out New York

“…everything a first feature should be, fast and loose, breathless and beautiful…” Philadelphia City Paper