Garden of Stars

In November 2014 the Iconic club Madame Jojos closed its doors. This event being interpreted by many as the death knell of Soho.The gentrification of Soho affects the LGBT community and its Drag Queen sub-culture, but the cabaret atmosphere of the entire neighborhood in enormous ways. This active pursuit to destroy a bubbling and vibrant part of the city's heart is viewed by many as an atrocity akin to turning the lights off on Broadway. Over 3rd of London's music venues have been closed in recent years and no one noticed. An active movement to bring a halt to this disaster has begun to unfold with one organization after another emerging to fight for Soho. Organizations made up of citizens and celebrities have sprung up to combat this onslaught. Will they win this battle and save Soho?

Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my Soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my Soul to take.

Describing herself as a 'street queen,' Johnson was a legendary fixture in New York City’s gay ghetto and a tireless voice for LGBT pride since the days of Stonewall, who along with fellow trans icon Sylvia Rivera, founded Street Transvestites Action Revolutionaries (S.T.A.R.), a trans activist group based in the heart of NYC’s Greenwich Village. Her death in 1992 was declared a suicide by the NYPD, but friends never accepted that version of events. Structured as a whodunit, with activist Victoria Cruz cast as detective and audience surrogate, The Death and Life of Marsha P. Johnson celebrates the lasting political legacy of Johnson, while seeking to finally solve the mystery of her unexplained death.

After a quarter-century of political denial and social stigma, of stunning scientific breakthroughs, bitter policy battles and inadequate prevention campaigns, HIV/AIDS continues to spread rapidly throughout much of the world. Through interviews with AIDS researchers, world leaders, activists, and patients, FRONTLINE investigates the science, politics, and human cost of this fateful disease and asks: What are the lessons of the past, and what can be done to stop AIDS?

A documentary team follows a group of drag queens and their lives.

After an unlikely casting onto a reality television show, 47-year old suburban telemarketer Ed Popil leaves his job to pursue a full-time entertainment industry career as his drag queen alter ego, 1960’s era housewife Mrs. Kasha Davis.

The human being feels generally as fascinated as fearful before death and the inevitable fact of dying. Workers at the cemetery of Palma de Mallorca, in Spain, face this harsh reality every day, so they have found a way to deal with it.

Ricardo was once Sara, a homeless HIV positive transvestite, living in the underbelly of Manhattan. Today he is a churchgoing, married man, "saved" by a Dallas ministry. He has renounced his homosexuality, but is his conversion complete? Susana Aiken and Carlos Aparicio offer an intimate look at Ricardo's transformation.

Explores the lives of Sara, Gigi and Giovanna, three Latino transvestites who for years have lived on the streets of Manhattan supporting their drug addictions through prostitution. They made their temporary home inside broken garbage trucks that the Sanitation Department keeps next to the salt deposits used in the winter to melt the snow. The three friends share the place known as "The Salt Mines".

A crew of HIV+ sailors compete in the Trans-Pacific Yacht Race that travels from California to Hawaii.

World-renowned Drag Queen Miz Cracker helps a Texas family that’s experiencing strange occurrences after renovating their 1892 home. As a lover of the paranormal, can Miz Cracker solve their ghost problem and help them coexist peacefully with the spirits?

A stark documentary about young male prostitutes in Prague, aged 15 to 18, who work the streets, train stations, and clubs. Through candid interviews and behind-the-scenes footage of gay porn shoots, the film explores their lives, struggles, and dreams, touching on themes of exploitation, identity, AIDS, and survival.

In this filmed version of cult film director John Waters' popular one-man show, the Pink Flamingos and A Dirty Shame director takes the stage to discuss everything from his early influences, fondest career memories, and notorious struggles against the MPAA rating system. Part endearing memoir and part hilarious lecture, This Filthy World touches on everything from the insanity of contemporary pop culture to the director's unforgettable early collaborations with inimitable Pink Flamingos star Divine.

In May 2016, Christopher Caldwell - better known as Bob The Drag Queen, won the incredibly popular TV show "RuPaul's Drag Race". This documentary covers both his life and career before, during and after the show as well as a comedy special he did in June 2016.

Letter Beyond the Walls reconstructs the trajectory of HIV and AIDS with a focus on Brazil, through interviews with doctors, activists, patients and other actors, in addition to extensive archival material. From the initial panic to awareness campaigns, passing through the stigma imposed on people living with HIV, the documentary shows how society faced this epidemic in its deadliest phase over more than two decades. With this historical approach as its base, the film looks at the way HIV is viewed in today's society, revealing a picture of persistent misinformation and prejudice, which especially affects Brazil’s most historically vulnerable populations.

The three-decade-old annual Manhattan gathering of drag queens and their fans is portrayed in this colorful documentary. The film concentrates on the spectacle of the event, providing abundant examples of the elaborate costumes, flamboyant wigs, and campy musical performances that characterize the event.

Sex Positive explores the life of Richard Berkowitz, a revolutionary gay S&M hustler turned AIDS activist in the 1980s, whose incomparable contribution to the invention of safe sex has never been aptly credited. Mr. Berkowitz emerged from the epicenter of the epidemic demanding a solution to the problem before the outside world would take heed. Now destitute and alone, Mr. Berkowitz tells his story to a world who never wanted to listen.

In 1967, New York City is host to the Miss All-American Camp Beauty Pageant. This documentary takes a look behind the scenes, transporting the viewer into rehearsals and dressing rooms as the drag queen subculture prepares for this big national beauty contest. Jack/Sabrina is the mistress of ceremonies, and their protégé, Miss Harlow, is in the competition. But, as the pageant approaches, the glamorous contestants veer from camaraderie to tension.

This film tells the story of the unknown pre-history of the AIDS virus, long before people started to die in the US and Europe. Following a team of scientists we uncover a forgotten medical archive in the Democratic Republic of Congo, that tells of an epidemic a full two decades before anyone knew about the novel killer. From high-tech labs in the US to African medics who have their boots on the ground, we trace HIV back to its origin in the jungles of Cameroon. In the decades around the turn of the 20th century, colonialism fundamentally changed the lives of millions of people in central Africa; it created an environment that allowed HIV to leave its original host, the chimpanzee, and start to spread in humans.

Trailblazing artists, activists, and everyday people from across the spectrum of gender and sexuality defy social norms and dare to live unconventional lives in this kaleidoscopic view of LGBTQ+ culture in contemporary Japan.