Margaret Cho: The Outsider Comedian Who Found a Way In

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            “Choligarchy” returns to the Bay Area for a limited engagement, September 15-19, at Berkeley Rep.  Tickets are on sale now here. 

Photo by Albert Sanchez

By Noma Faingold.                                               

 (Updated August 6, 2026) 

Trailblazing comedian Margaret Cho has always made sure her brazen stand-up material aligns with her feminist, politically progressive and all-inclusive views on sexuality. What is radically different about the 57-year-old San Francisco native is that her once chaotic, dangerous life has gradually evolved into a that of a serene homebody, who surrounds herself with animal and plant life.

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You Don’t Have To Be…..

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Jewish.

By Gary Meyer.  (updated August 1 ,2026)

Family dramas, Amazing Sea Monkeys, Hollywood censorship, Woody Guthrie, the Middle East conflicts, Berlin’s nightlife, uncomfortable secrets, teenage angst, many kinds of music, short films, Holocaust stories we never knew, New Yorker cartoonists, LBGTQ lives, inside the most famous Catskills summer resort, and family comedies.

These are some of the stories at the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival playing through Sunday, August 2. Continue reading →

Captivating Picks from Eclectic Lineup at the Frameline50 Film Festival

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By Noma Faingold                                     (June 13, 2026)

Frameline50, the annual San Francisco International LGBTQ+ Film Festival, is celebrating its 50th anniversary, June 17-27. The milestone is a big deal for the largest and longest-running queer film festival in the world. Several San Francisco and East Bay venues, including the newly restored Castro Theater, will host 140 films from 35 countries with LGBTQ+ themes by mostly queer filmmakers. Programming for the 11-day event also includes parties, networking events and industry panels.

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Queer Love Triumphs Over Fear in “Minister Chucky”

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By Noma Faingold.       (June 11, 2026)

“Minister Chucky,” a short film about the unconventional Las Vegas wedding of a queer couple, officiated by a killer doll Chucky impersonator, from the eight-installment “Child’s Play” horror movie franchise, is funny until you consider the full context of the celebration and the subsequent plans for the pair to flee the United States under the bleak Donald Trump regime.

Filmmakers non-binary Graham Kolbeins and trans man Jonathan Andre Culliton documented their cheeky nuptials, along with their life choices before and after the festivities. The 11-minute film highlights love and resistance in times when the LGBTQ+ community is under attack.

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Food Set Chef Melissa King Free

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By Noma Faingold   (Updated October 2, 2025)

Chef Melissa King was not like the other kids growing up in Whittier, a small city in Los Angeles County. While her peers watched Saturday morning cartoons, she was glued to Julie Child shows, Martin Yan’s “Yan Can Cook” and other television cooking programs.

“I was always very interested in food and I liked to eat,” King said.

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The Life of an Independent Film Producer

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By Noma Faingold  (June 13, 2025)

Prolific, award-winning independent film producer Marc Smolowitz has more than 60 credits in his three-decade career. He’s raised at least $30 million for projects in every genre. At any given time, he is the driving force behind 10 films in various stages of production, including at this very moment.

Photo by Noma Faingold

He doesn’t shy away from declaring why he’s had consistent success and longevity in the ever-changing indie film industry. “I’m fearless and relentless,” Smolowitz said. “I know how to do this job very, very well.”

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Isaac Julien Dreams A World

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By Noma Faingold (April 16, 2025)

Watching the 28-minute, 10-screen film/art installation, “Lessons of the Hour,” by British artist/filmmaker Sir Isaac Julien, isn’t as overwhelming as one might think. In fact, the flood of images, sounds and words, dedicated to the life of writer, orator, philosopher, and social justice activist Fredrick Douglass (1818-1895), a former slave, allows the viewer to absorb and interpret the immersive experience in their own way.

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Partners in Food and Film: An Interview

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An Interview with SIFF27 Culinary Excellence Award winner, Chef Susan Feniger and filmmaker Liz Lachman.

By Geneva Anderson

(March 20, 2024)

When Los Angeles filmmaker and Emmy award winner Liz Lachman (“Pin-Up,” “Getting to Know You”) set out to make her first feature-length film about partner, Chef Susan Feniger, opening her first solo restaurant in Los Angeles in 2009, she already had lots of footage.  The idea of capturing Susan’s journey in realizing “Street,” a dining concept that would bring a variety of global street foods together under one roof and doing this without her longtime business partner and co-chef Mary Sue Milliken, had been simmering for 13 years. Continue reading →

Lulu By the Bay

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by Thomas Gladysz

(Updated May 8, 2023 to inclde photos from the May 6th performance)

On Saturday, May 6, the San Francisco Silent Film Festival is set to screen Pandora’s Box at the Paramount theater in Oakland. This legendary silent film, which stars Louise Brooks as Lulu, can rightly be described as a Bay Area favorite. In fact, as exhibition records suggest, Pandora’s Box has been screened more often in the San Francisco Bay Area than anywhere else in the United States.

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All The Beauty and Bloodshed

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By C.J. Hirschfield

(March 10, 2023)

The documentary feature All the Beauty and the Bloodshed is actually three movies in one. Directed by 2015 Academy Award winner Laura Poitras (Citizenfour), the film explores the art, life, and political activism of internationally renowned artist Nan Goldin, whose story could not be more compelling. Through her photos, slideshows, interviews and video footage, we get a real sense of what inspired both her art and her activism.

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