Jada Bethea

2023 HEAR US Awardee
Undergraduate Film & TV Class of 2023

Jada Bethea

Jada Bethea is a Black, lesbian filmmaker who challenges hyper-sexual depictions of sapphic, Black relationships through narratives that prioritize emotional intimacy. With tragedies saturating queer and Black cinema, she aims to tell stories that portray both communities beyond their struggles.

Project

"Flour Girl"

Attend the sessions. Get the paperwork signed. Jonah has no intention of baring her heart and spilling her secrets. So when presented with the opportunity to reveal her true sexuality and the traumatic events that landed her in mandated counseling, Jonah chooses to suffer in silence. That is until she finds a friend in Aaliyah and falls hard for her charms. But if Jonah wants to keep Aaliyah’s company and build a relationship beyond the platonic, she must decide what's more important: keeping her queer identity a secret or gaining the freedom to love and be loved.

Flour Girl is a love letter to Black lesbians; a story where two dark-skinned women get their chance at a happy ending. This short film also stands in protest of the policing of Black emotions. Black anger is put under a microscope and demonized, leading to self-censorship, but this film refuses to mince words to accommodate a world that persecutes the people instead of the stereotype.

Jada Bethea, has been an openly queer Black woman for four years. But every day before coming out, she turned on the TV and was surrounded by White men and women loving each other and being celebrated for their love, and all she wanted was the freedom to live like them. Public displays of affection in the LGBTQ+ community are surrounded by a lot of fear and shame. As a Black lesbian, Jada knows what it's like to live in a world that's not made for you and through the love and beauty of Flour Girl, she wants to show others like her that regardless, their lives are still worth living.

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