Kimberly Reed is the director of the 2024 film I’m Your Venus, which is having its Texas premiere at Denton’s Thin Line Fest 2025. Last year, the documentary made its U.S. and international premieres at Tribeca Film Festival and BFI London Film Festival, respectively.
I’m Your Venus follows the quest for justice for Venus Pellagatti Xtravaganza decades after her murder. The young trans woman first appeared on screen in the 1990 film Paris Is Burning, expressing her dreams of becoming a model and living a normal and fulfilled life, but she was murdered before the release of the film. Venus’s brothers and the House of Xtravaganza seek answers surrounding her death and work to honor her memory in this 2024 documentary.
Hallie Harper is a third-year Master of Fine Arts student of documentary production and studies at the University of North Texas. She talks with Reed and Dominique Jackson, one of the film’s executive producers, on behalf of Thin Line Fest.
See I’m Your Venus
: April 27 at the Campus Theatre
For more information about screenings and the festival, visit ThinLine.us.
Responses were edited lightly for clarity and length.
Hallie Harper: I just kind of want to start out with hearing what inspired this film and the making of this film and how it came to be and how you got in touch with the participants and started the journey of making this.
Dominique Jackson: So I was contacted by Genovia Chase and Mike Strafford, who also executive produces on this, and Mike and his wife, June — they saw a need for, you know, they saw about Venus’s situation ... they were getting the name change done posthumously and they were all working on it together. And then it was like, why not turn this into a film to show the world? What can happen? Because this is one of the first name changes that has happened posthumously in the U.S. This is like a landmark case.
And then to get her house named as a historical landmark and stuff like that, and it was like, you know what, we should document this. And then knowing that she was never really given her flowers — she [Venus] died right before Paris is Burning was released. So no one heard from her or anything. And then with what’s happening with our community, especially today. Our community needs to be uplifted, and there are many trans women of color that are continuously murdered and it’s like we need to put out there that we have support. We show support. And so they were trying to find a way to solve the case, and that was the intention.
But what came out of it, in my opinion, was a documentary that spoke to the life memorialized, obituarized and honored Venus Xtravaganza. Because of her and her experience, she has taught a lot of us to be careful. I believe she saved my life included.
But the main reason for getting this done was to show trans visibility, to show what happens to our lives, to show that we can have family supporters. To show what happens to our family when we’re murdered. You know, it’s like a wake-up call to families. A wake-up call to the world. A wake-up call for the trans women to even be even more careful. And I think that’s where we started.
Kimberly Reed: In many ways, the film has to go back to the original. At least it does for me, it goes back to the original film Paris Is Burning and the first time I saw it, which was early on in my transition, and it really helped me to see a bunch of, you know, beautiful trans women expressing themselves and a wide variety of gender expressions, right? But especially the story of Venus Xtravaganza, which hits so hard when you’re watching this film, especially for the first time — and you find that this person that you’ve come to know during the documentary is suddenly taken away from you.
It hit me extremely hard, but as is the case so often with the portrayal of trans folks in the media, even though the story can be a difficult one, ... I think that especially at the time I was so hungry to see any sort of representation of trans women on the screen that I was willing to take the good with the bad, to take all of this good news about the life and promise and positivity and just promise of the ability to express oneself, regardless of the sex you were assigned at birth. That you take this very difficult and challenging and kind of bracing message that Venus’s example delivers in the film and kind of try to accommodate both, you know.
Harper: Do you feel that the importance and the meaning of this film has evolved, especially over the last few months, as things have been changing in regards to the LGBT community and how all of that is looking?
Jackson: Yes, I do, because in the last couple of months — and I know you’re speaking about the change of administration and then the inauguration and the constant attacks on us — it became even more important for this film to be out. To me it’s like it couldn’t even be coincidence, it’s like we divinely directed it to take on this mission, so that it would be here to help us through this. Because for folks that have seen it, they are just like, “This gives us hope.” It gives us hope for family. It gives us hope that ... if the administration doesn’t see us, at least we know we will have the support of our families. And that is a little bit more than we had back in the ’90s and 2000s.
It’s especially important right now, especially for our trans youth, because for them, they’re feeling lost. They are seeing their friends, their peers, die horrendously, and we’re not just talking murders now — we’re talking suicides. Since this election and inauguration, we’ve even had Elisa Shupe, who was one of the first nonbinary people to get their gender marker changed, who has committed suicide. There’s so much going on there — other news of increased violence towards trans people all over the place. So right now, for a film like Venus to be out, it shows: Look at what can happen when you deny people the right to exist.
If Venus was given that support and comfort, she may have never ended up in the hotel [where she died]. She might have been on her path to continue to model. She might have had more if the world was more open and realizing that she’s just a human being just like everyone else and deserves the same health and comfort and love and support. Because of this, you have so many trans people that were denied and now, telling her story, especially in this time, is awakening. It’s like, hopefully it’s like an explosion of “Here we are, you can’t deny it. So, no matter what you throw at us or how you try to hold us down, we’re still saying to you we’re thriving and moving forward. Here’s our film that shows joy and connection and love and support.”
Reed: I would just remind readers and viewers of the film that we’re also in a moment where the administration is quite literally trying to erase trans people from existence. And you know, a lot of times we talk about erasure and it has some sort of metaphorical content ... just using it sort of as an expression that we use from day-to-day. But when at the Stonewall memorial, of all places, the current administration is trying to remove the T from the very common expression LGBT, where the current administration is quite literally trying to erase trans people — from public life, from history. Especially at a memorial where trans women were instrumental in starting the whole conversation, the whole rebellion, the whole reason that all of us know what Stonewall is today.
So, in addition to all of the very important issues that we confront in the film that Dominique has spoken about, I would just remind folks that when you try to erase us, when you try to erase a class of people who very clearly exist now, very clearly existed back in the time of Stonewall, has existed throughout the existence of humanity. We have always been here, we will always be here. When you try to erase us, it puts us in a position where it causes even more harm.
Harper: Have you considered or had any concern for the fact that the work shown being done in the film of declaring Venus’s home a historical landmark and this kind of things, do you have any considerations that all of these efforts of erasure are going to impact that work that was done?
Jackson: Well, with our work with Garden State Equality, see, that’s the thing: It’s a fight, and we keep fighting and we are working on Venus House, where not only is the house going to be named a historical landmark, but the house will be turned into a museum, a center for trans people, a transitional housing. A place for support, a place for youth to be able to connect offline. Because right now our youth are only finding support [online]. ... The fear, the pressure is pushing them to go back underground, and when we go underground, that is when you have those people that take advantage of us. You know, when we are allowed to work freely and do all that stuff, sex work becomes something that becomes a choice, not a necessity. So, creating Venus House is really important — that goes along with this film in order to be resilient against all that’s happening.
Actually, what I will say is, I feel that when we come under attack, we fight back even harder. As you have seen, there have been protests all over the country. People have been standing up. People have been speaking out and those that did vote for this thinking that they were getting lesser taxes and reduced eggs are now realizing that they have to deal with a whole lot more when a president that’s supposed to be a president for the people in a democracy tweets that they are king.
And so, for us, this film and doing the house is again about being resilient. You know, we could have said, “Oh no,” and networks could say, “Oh no, we don’t want this.” But we will continue to push, and we will always continue to push, because this is the time, right? At Stonewall, the lesbians could dance with the gay men, right? But when you’re in full drag, who are you hiding? There’s no hiding there. So, these attacks were against the trans people at Stonewall, which turned into a movement that the gay rights movement claimed. And I know that gay people were under attack back then, but I’ve spoken with people, heard the stories, even spoke with veterans from Stonewall, who have said to me honestly: When the cops came in, we danced with each other. But it was our drag queens, our trans people, our androgynous people, our nonbinary people who were affected the most. So, when they threw that brick, it was because they were tired.
So, right now, I’m Your Venus and the Venus House is our new brick and we are going to throw it.
Harper: What would you say is the biggest lesson you’ve learned while working on this project?
Jackson: Well, the filmmaker part of this is all you, Kim, because even though we gave our way and spoke as executive producers, you were the one that was in that moment, that was able to read those expressions on their faces to see what was really there. So we all kind of push for that. So, this is for you Kim.
Reed: Oh, thank you. I appreciate that. I mean, it’s hard to whittle that down to just one thing or the most important thing that you learned. You know, as Dominique mentioned, this initial quest started out as an effort to find out what really happened to Venus, to seek justice and to hold whoever did this to Venus responsible. The Pellagattis really needed to get that answer. The Xtravaganzas needed to get that answer. In fact, the whole ballroom community needed to get that answer, and that justice is so important to pursue.
I would also say for some people who may think that this film is a kind of a run-of-the-mill true crime story, where we’re going to go find out what happened, is that ... the journey for the Pellagattis and the Xtravaganzas to take to find out what happened to Venus ended up being much more valuable and revealing, and even satisfying perhaps, than having a quick, clear answer about what happened to Venus.
Because when those answers don’t come right away, you see really beautiful things happen, like this merging of these two families, of Venus’s biological family and Venus’s ballroom family, and to see the Pellagattis and Xtravaganzas working toward this — these things that are much larger than either of the families, much larger than Venus, these ongoing legal victories that cannot be taken away. These are now enshrined in law, and these can be quoted by other families, other people who are trying to seek justice. I mean, that’s quite an accomplishment. And that would not have happened if we had had simple, quick, answers to some of the things.