Talent Guide

Jen Rainin

  • Discipline:Director
  • Program Year:Documentary Lab 2019

Bio

Jen Rainin’s work in film is focused on building community, deepening understanding of social justice issues, and telling great stories. Her executive producer credits include Stage Left (2011), a documentary about the history of theater in the Bay Area, and Two Spirits (2009), a documentary about gender identity in Native American cultures which aired on Independent Lens. As CEO of the Kenneth Rainin Foundation, Jen created a grant and filmmaker services program in partnership with SFFILM to support narrative filmmakers in the Bay Area whose work addresses issues of social justice. Through these grants, she has supported such films as Beasts of the Southern Wild, Fruitvale Station, Test, Circumstance, Sorry to Bother You, and Short Term 12. With SFFILM, Jen created the Producer’s Fellowship to help independent producers develop sustainable careers, and the Women Filmmaker Fellowship to work toward gender parity in the filmmaking community. A trained Meisner actress, Jen has
worked both on Bay Area stages and in independent film.

Current Project

Ahead of the Curve

Logline

With a fist full of credit cards, a lucky run at the horse track, and a title that called to mind a certain French film star, Franco Stevens launched the best-selling lesbian lifestyle magazine ever published, making lesbians more visible both to each other and to the mainstream. Ahead of the Curve draws a through-line from the launch of Curve magazine in the early 90s to the vibrant creative visibility and intersectional community-building work within the lesbian and queer women’s community today.