Jenni Olson

Jenni Olson
Filmmaker and historian Jenni Olson (2015)
Born (1962-10-06) October 6, 1962 (age 62)
Falcon Heights, Minnesota
NationalityAmerican
Alma materUniversity of Minnesota
Occupation(s)Film curator, filmmaker, author, LGBT film historian
Notable workCo-founder of LGBT website PlanetOut.com, Co-founder of the Minneapolis/St.Paul Lesbian, Gay, Bi & Transgender Film Festival

Jenni Olson (born October 6, 1962) is a writer, archivist, historian, consultant, and non-fiction filmmaker based in Berkeley, California. She co-founded the pioneering LGBT website PlanetOut.com.[1] Her two feature-length essay films — The Joy of Life (2005) and The Royal Road (2015) — premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. Her work as an experimental filmmaker and her expansive personal collection of LGBTQ film prints and memorabilia were acquired in April 2020 by the Harvard Film Archive,[2] and her reflection on the last 30 years of LGBT film history was published as a chapter in The Oxford Handbook of Queer Cinema from Oxford University Press in 2021.[3] In 2020, she was named to the Out Magazine Out 100 list.[4] In 2021, she was recognized with the prestigious Special TEDDY Award at the Berlin Film Festival.[5] She also campaigned to have a barrier erected on the Golden Gate Bridge to prevent suicides.[6]

  1. ^ Diduck, Ryan (June 2006). "Inside the Homo Studio: with Jenni Olson". Offscreen. Archived from the original on 17 July 2020. Retrieved 27 June 2021.
  2. ^ "Jenni Olson Queer Film Collection - Collection". Harvard Film Archive. Retrieved 28 July 2021.
  3. ^ "Oxford Handbooks - Oxford University Press". global.oup.com. Retrieved 28 July 2021.
  4. ^ "See the Full 2020 Out100 List Here". www.out.com. 19 November 2020. Retrieved 28 July 2021.
  5. ^ "Jenni Olson: 'I remember walking out of the movie theatre like, "Yeah, I'm a cowboy!"'". the Guardian. 2021-06-15. Retrieved 2021-06-27.
  6. ^ Blum, Andrew (March 20, 2005). "Suicide Watch". The New York Times. Retrieved October 3, 2015.