At lunchtime on June 5, a sunlit room inside the Greenwich Hotel hosted a well-dressed array of female film enthusiasts and celebrities, including Katie Holmes, Meg Ryan, Jodie Foster, Myha’la, Maggie Rogers, and Cazzie David, who had gathered to toast the Tribeca Festival’s partnership with Chanel for the pair’s annual Through Her Lens program.
Wearing a mix of casual and elevated daytime fashion—with Chanel pieces in abundance—the guests spilled out onto a verdant courtyard; sipped cucumber spritzes and white wine; nibbled on prosciutto sandwiches, shrimp cocktail, and an elegant charcuterie, cheese, and crudité spread; and waved white paper fans passed out to ward off the high-80s heat.
The gorgeous surroundings served as a backdrop for a broader, more “urgent” objective. Founded in 2015 by Tribeca and Chanel, the Through Her Lens program provides self-identifying women and non-binary filmmakers in the U.S. with financial and creative support through mentorship and funding. As film producer and Tribeca Festival co-founder Jane Rosenthal put it to the assembled crowd, “When we launched this program with Chanel 12 years ago, the goal was not just to host a beautiful lunch—though Chanel does make that very easy—the goal was to create something unique and needed: a space for women filmmakers to tell their stories on their own terms with access to mentorship, resources, funding, and community that believes in them.”
She continued, “That mission feels more urgent than ever…history isn’t only erased when books are burned or monuments are torn down. History is erased when contributions go unrecognized, when achievements go uncredited, when stories are never funded, never produced, never preserved. Every time a voice is excluded from the record, our understanding of who we are becomes smaller. It changes how all of us understand the world. It changes what we believe is possible. It changes who future generations think belongs in the room.”
Addressing the filmmakers in the room, in particular, she added: “That is why the work you do matters—not just because you make films, but because you shape culture. You help us understand one another. You challenge what we think we know. You create empathy. In a world that increasingly rewards outrage, empathy is an act of courage.”
Midway through the event, Rosenthal also announced that Tribeca selection Jean-Michel Basquiat, a documentary co-directed by Quinn Whitney Wilson and Viridiana Lieberman, had been officially picked up by Netflix. Wilson, who was in the room, stood up and performed an impromptu dance of joy as the audience applauded.
Rosenthal ultimately concluded, “I’ve been in this business a very long time, and I’ve heard every excuse for why things shouldn’t get made. And yet the films that move culture forward are almost always the one that someone told you not to make. That is what Through Her Lens is about: not just opening the door but helping more women walk through the door, and holding it open for the next person behind you.”
See more images from the Through Her Lens luncheon below.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.elle.com ’
