UnErased podcast will uncover the history and damaging effects conversion therapy has on LGBTQIA youth in America
New York, NY, August 30, 2018 – Limina House, Focus Features, and Anonymous Content announced today that the filmmakers behind the anticipated fall film Boy Erased along with the creators of the widely acclaimed Radiolab podcast and radio program will launch a new podcast, UnErased, this fall. The four-part podcast series will reveal the controversial truth behind the “pray away the gay” movement and conversion therapy in America. The series will be produced by Limina House, which was started by Mikel Ellcessor, the co-creator with Jad Abumrad of Radiolab. The UnErased production team is Ellcessor, Kat Aaron, Alice Quinlan and Shima Oliaee with the author of the Boy Erased memoir Garrard Conley, whose life story and experience with conversion therapy is the basis for the film, and the film’s co-producer and cast member David Joseph Craig. Abumrad provided editorial oversight and conducted key interviews.
It is estimated that between 700,000 – 800,000 Americans have been subjected to conversion therapy – damaging and harmful practices designed to “convert” someone from gay to straight. Using original reporting, sound rich design and deep interviews with individuals who have experienced, led and criticized conversion therapy, UnErased’s four episodes will reveal a deeply troubling part of our culture. Working with The Mattachine Society, one of the foremost LGBTQIA historical archives and a major collector of conversion therapy source material, UnErased brings virtually unheard recordings and documents from key conversion therapy groups and leaders into the light and combines them with original interviews to reveal a complex, and increasingly global, attack on the health and well-being of LGBTQIA youth.
“This series, the original journalism that’s taking place, the stories that are being brought into the light, could not have happened without Joel and Garrard, David, Kerry and everyone at Focus, Anonymous and Stitcher. This is an incredible demonstration of people across creative disciplines pulling together to test new boundaries for storytelling, content delivery and community engagement. It’s our hope that fans of the film, Garrard’s memoir and the podcast series will immerse themselves in all of these different works so they can have a richer understanding of the context of Garrard’s story. It’s a story that is shared by hundreds of thousands of others and goes on today,” said Limina House producer Mikel Ellcessor. “Limina House is dedicated to creating work where new worlds of insight and emotion open up and we learn something new about ourselves and the lives we lead. Being a part of Boy Erased is a privilege.”
“Boy Erased tells a deeply personal story; UnErased tells the whole story. Combining one of the most comprehensive conversion therapy histories to date, survivors’ accounts, and exclusive interviews, UnErased will pick up where the memoir and film leave off,” commented Garrard Conley and David Joseph Craig. “We are honored and thrilled to have partnered with podcast-juggernauts Jad Abumrad and Mikel Ellcessor and are working closely with the Mattachine Society of D.C. and other LGBTQ advocacy groups to usher our queer stories into the permanent archives of American history, where they have always belonged.”
UnErased will be made available exclusively to Stitcher Premium subscribers in the weeks before the film’s November 2 release. It will be available everywhere you get podcasts coinciding with the film’s limited release. Limina House is producing the series for Focus Features and Anonymous Content. The series is being distributed by Stitcher. UnErased is not a Radiolab production.
From writer/director Joel Edgerton, Boy Erased tells the story of Jared (Academy Award® nominee Lucas Hedges), the son of a Baptist pastor in a small American town, who is outed to his parents (Academy Award® winners Nicole Kidman and Russell Crowe) at age 19. Jared is faced with an ultimatum: attend a conversion therapy program – or be permanently exiled and shunned by his family, friends, and faith. Boy Erased is the true story of one young man’s struggle to find himself while being forced to question every aspect of his identity.
Edgerton produces alongside Anonymous Content’s Kerry Kohansky-Roberts and Steve Golin, an Academy Award-winning producer of Best Picture Oscar winner Spotlight. Troye Sivan, Xavier Dolan, Cherry Jones, Michael “Flea” Balzary, Joe Alwyn, Emily Hinkler, Jesse LaTourette, David Joseph Craig, Théodore Pellerin, Madelyn Cline, and Britton Sear co-star. Boy Erased will be released by Focus Features on November 2, 2018.
Focus Features acquires and produces specialty films for the global market and holds a library of iconic movies from fearless filmmakers. Current and upcoming domestic releases from Focus include Jason Reitman’s new comedy Tully, starring Charlize Theron and written by Diablo Cody; Won’t You Be My Neighbor?, director Morgan Neville’s documentary on Mister Rogers; Lenny Abrahamson’s atmospheric thriller The Little Stranger; Joel Edgerton’s coming-of-age and coming-out drama Boy Erased, about a boy’s true-life experience at a conversion therapy program, starring Lucas Hedges, Nicole Kidman and Russell Crowe; Mary, Queen of Scots with Saoirse Ronan as Mary and Margot Robbie as Elizabeth I; On the Basis of Sex, the real-life drama of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg staring Felicity Jones and Armie Hammer; Asghar Farhadi’s Spanish-language drama Everybody Knows (Todos lo Saben) starring Javier Bardem and Penélope Cruz; Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre’s directorial debut Mustang; and Spike Lee’s new film BlacKkKlansman.
Focus is part of Universal Filmed Entertainment Group (UFEG), which produces, acquires, markets and distributes filmed entertainment worldwide in various media formats for theatrical, home entertainment, television and other distribution platforms, as well as consumer products, interactive gaming and live entertainment. UFEG’s global division also includes Universal Pictures, Universal Pictures Home Entertainment, Universal Brand Development, Fandango, DreamWorks Animation Film and Television and Awesomeness. UFEG is part of NBCUniversal, one of the world’s leading media and entertainment companies in the development, production and marketing of entertainment, news and information to a global audience. NBCUniversal owns and operates a valuable portfolio of news and entertainment networks, a premier motion picture company, significant television production operations, a
leading television stations group, world-renowned theme parks and a suite of leading Internet-based businesses. NBCUniversal is a subsidiary of Comcast Corporation.
For more information please visit www.focusfeatures.com
