Event Details
As the saying goes, “no man is an island” and that is especially true for the film and television industries! Join LPFF 2025 Artists in Residence, Elegance Bratton (The Inspection, Pier Kids) and Chester Algernal Gordon (By Any Means, Move Ya Body: The Birth of House), as they discuss how they’ve built their creative teams over the years and examine the importance of crafting a film/tv crew that thrives on cooperation. Plus, Chester and Elegance will provide invaluable advice on how you can create a collaborative environment on your own film & TV sets.
Note: This seminar is labeled as “Artist in Residence Seminar 1” on the RSVP Form and on the physical festival program.
Guests:
Elegance Bratton, Director
Elegance Bratton is an award-winning and boundary-breaking director, writer and producer. He began making films as a US Marine after spending a decade homeless. His work captures stories untold with an intention to show the universal power of our shared humanity. Bratton’s films have played in over 200 film festivals worldwide including the New York Film Festival, Toronto, Sundance, Outfest, BFI, Doc NYC, and the BlackStar Film Festival. He was recently named one of VARIETY’s 10 Directors to Watch for 2023.
Bratton made his television debut as the creator and executive producer of Viceland’s My House. The series, which chronicled underground competitive ballroom dancing, was nominated for Outstanding Documentary at the 2019 GLAAD Media Awards. In 2021, Bratton’s critically-acclaimed feature documentary, Pier Kids, won the Independent Spirit Awards’ Truer Than Fiction Award, which is presented to an emerging director of non- fiction features who has not yet received significant recognition. Pier Kids explores the lives of Black, homeless queer and transgender youth in New York.
The Inspection, his semi-autobiographical narrative fiction debut, world premiered as the opening night film of the Toronto International Film Festival Discovery section and was the closing night film of the New York Film Festival. The critically-acclaimed A24 film centers around a young homeless gay man who joins the Marine Corps to win back his mother’s love, but learns how to respect himself at bootcamp. The film has garnered numerous award nominations including from the Golden Globes, Gothams, and Film Independent Spirit Awards.
Bratton is currently in pre-production on his next narrative feature, By Any Means, an intense drama exploring themes of resilience and moral conflict. The film is produced by Chester Algernal Gordon, Alex Lebovici of Hammerstone, Basil Iwanyk and Erica Lee of Thunder Road Films, with Yahya Abdul-Mateen II and Mark Wahlberg set to lead the cast.
Bratton also co-runs the production company, Freedom Principle, alongside his producing partner, Chester Algernal Gordon. He was a Sundance 2020 Native Lab mentor and a 2022 Outfest Screenwriting Lab mentor. Bratton holds a BS from Columbia University (2014) and MFA from NYU Tisch Graduate Film (2019). He and his partner live in Baltimore.
Chester Algernal Gordon, Producer
Chester Algernal Gordon is a producer whose work sparks conversations across political and cultural lines, exploring identity, humanity, and purpose. Their films have premiered at the world’s leading festivals, including Sundance, TIFF, NYFF, Tribeca, BFI, Thessaloniki Documentary Festival, and Docs Against Gravity.
Gordon produced The Inspection (A24), starring Jeremy Pope and Gabrielle Union, which earned Golden Globe, Gotham, and Independent Spirit Award nominations, won NAACP and GLAAD Awards, and was named one of the National Board of Review’s Top Ten Independent Films of the year. They also produced Pier Kids, winner of the Truer Than Fiction Award at the Spirit Awards; Move Ya Body: The Birth of House (Sundance, Tribeca, Sheffield, Sydney, Melbourne); and the Sundance Jury Prize–winning short -Ship: A Visual Poem. Upcoming projects include By Any Means, a civil rights–mafia action film directed by Elegance Bratton and starring Mark Wahlberg and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II.
Before producing, Gordon built a career as a costume designer on studio features and award-winning shorts, including Mariama Diallo’s Hair Wolf (Sundance Jury Award winner) and Danielle Lessovitz’s Port Authority, executive produced by Martin Scorsese, which premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. This foundation in visual storytelling continues to give their producing a distinct aesthetic and narrative edge.
On the television side, Gordon was a producer on the MIPCOM 2018-winning and GLAAD-nominated documentary series My House (Viceland). They are the co-founder of Freedom Principle with Elegance Bratton, a 2019 Tribeca Film Institute All Access and Pond5 grantee, and a Film Independent Producing Lab & Fast Track fellow. In 2025, Gordon was selected as a Gotham / Cannes Producers Network Fellow.
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