Rochester Native Brings Her Famous Film Home To Benefit Deaf Students

From: NTID - Mar 16, 2007

Contact: Karen E. Black
kebnmr@rit.edu
(585)-475-6840 v/TTY


ROCHESTER NATIVE BRINGS HER FAMOUS FILM
HOME TO BENEFIT DEAF STUDENTS

ROCHESTER, N.Y., March 16--Rochester native and award-winning filmmaker Irene Taylor Brodsky will attend a special screening of her latest work, Hear and Now, at 7 p.m. June 14 at the Panara Theatre at Rochester Institute of Technology.

The film recently stole the audiences’ hearts at the famous weeklong Sundance Film Festival, where it was awarded the favorite documentary, and has since been moving audiences nationwide to tears and laughter.

An intimate memoir, Hear and Now tells the story of Taylor Brodsky’s deaf parents, Paul and Sally Taylor, and their decision at the age of 65 to undergo risky cochlear implant surgery, a procedure that could give them the ability to hear. The film follows their complicated journey from a comfortable world of silence to a new and profoundly challenging world of sound.

The June 14 screening has special meaning to Taylor Brodsky because the proceeds from this event will benefit a scholarship in her parents’ honor to support deaf and hard-of-hearing film and animation students at RIT.

“Some may not connect deaf people with making films because sound is such a critical component,” explained Taylor Brodsky. “Creating this scholarship is very exciting because it will generate many more deaf filmmakers, who have a great deal to contribute to the art form. I hope my hometown will join us to support this important endeavor.”

This is the first time Taylor Brodsky and her parents are presenting the film together since its debut at Sundance, where audience members were very interested in learning more about the Taylors’ experience before, during and after the filming.

Following the screening, attendees can participate in a question and answer session with Taylor Brodsky and her parents, as well as personally meet them at a dessert reception immediately following in RIT’s Dyer Arts Center.

“At Sundance, we realized how much people wanted to ask about the film as well as learn more about their experience – of their lives and about making the film,” explained Taylor Brodsky. “Bringing the film to Rochester in a forum that will allow the audience to participate and share all that has happened since we stopped filming is especially meaningful to me.”

Paul and Sally Taylor both retired from Rochester Institute of Technology’s National Technical Institute for the Deaf. Paul worked as a professor for 30 years in Applied Computer Technology, and Sally worked in a variety of staff and faculty roles at RIT/NTID for 22 years.

A 1988 graduate of Brighton High School, Taylor Brodsky discovered her passion for photography and film in high school, and served as photo editor of the yearbook. She is an Emmy award-winning news and documentary producer, writer and photographer whose stories have aired on HBO, CBS, Fox, The History Channel, and A&E. She has earned numerous awards for her films on Polygamy and American History and won an Emmy for her documentary portrait of the late architect Samuel Mockbee. She is a graduate of New York University and Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism.

Tickets are available for $25 per person or $40 per couple by contacting Jeannette Vargas at 585-475-6836 (voice/TTY) or at jvargas@ntid.rit.edu.

NTID is the first and largest technological college in the world for deaf and hard-of-hearing students. One of eight colleges of RIT, NTID offers educational programs and access and support services to the 1,100 deaf and hard-of-hearing students from around the world who study, live, and socialize with 14,400 hearing students on RIT’s Rochester, N.Y., campus.

Web address: http://www.rit.edu/NTID

Visit www.rit.edu/ntid/newsroom for more NTID news.

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