Screening | Little Richard: I Am Everything (2023): documentary

Director Lisa Cortés’s Little Richard: I Am Everything tells the story of the Black queer origins of rock n’ roll, exploding the whitewashed canon of American pop music to reveal the innovator – the originator – Richard Penniman. Through a wealth of archive and performance that brings us into Richard’s complicated inner world, the film unspools the icon’s life story with all its switchbacks and contradictions. In interviews with family, musicians, and cutting-edge Black and queer scholars, the film reveals how Richard created an art form for ultimate self-expression, yet what he gave to the world he was never able to give to himself. Throughout his life, Richard careened like a shiny cracked pinball between God, sex, and rock n’ roll. The world tried to put him in a box, but Richard was an omni being who contained multitudes – he was unabashedly everything.

After the screening, there will be  a conversation with the film's director, Lisa Cortes; executive producer Dee Rees; and Chair of the Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music at NYU who appears in the film, Jason King; moderated by Emil Wilbekin, journalist and founder of Native Son.

About the Speakers
Lisa Cortés is an Academy Award–nominated and Emmy-winning producer and director renowned for creating challenging, visionary stories. The film Precious, which she executive produced, received the Sundance Audience Award and Grand Jury Prize for best drama. All In: The Fight For Democracy, which she directed with Liz Garbus, chronicles the battle waged by Stacey Abrams against voter suppression.

Jason King is the Chair of the Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music. A multi-talented Canadian-American scholar, journalist, author, musician, DJ, performer, producer, songwriter, radio and video host, and event curator, Jason has served in leadership positions since the founding of The Clive Davis Institute.

Emil Wilbekin is a multimedia maverick who has an expertise in editorial creation, content curation, and multimedia story telling (print, digital, social, video and live events), having served as Chief Content Officer at Afropunk, Editor-at-Large at Essence, Managing Editor of Essence.com, Editor-in-Chief of Giant and Giantmag.com, Style Guru at Complex Media, VP of Brand Development at Marc Eckō Enterprises, Editorial Director/Vice President of Vibe Ventures and Editor-in-Chief of Vibe Magazine. Under Wilbekin’s leadership, Vibe won the National Magazine Award for General Excellence in 2002. He contributes to Architectural Digest and Town & Country and is co-producer and writer on the documentary The Remix: Hip Hop X Fashion (Netflix). Wilbekin is the Founder of Native Son, a platform created to inspire and empower Black gay and queer men.