Wittig, Yes!

Logline

More than 50 years ago, Monique Wittig, acclaimed writer, theorist, and lesbian feminist icon, dared to envision a world beyond gender, which marked the beginning of the nonbinary concepts common today.

Told by her lifelong partner Sande Zeig, Wittig, Yes! unveils the synthesis of Wittig’s public and private personas, tracing the origins of her groundbreaking theories and their enduring impact on today’s evolving landscape of gender identity and social justice.

About Monique Wittig

Acclaimed writer and lesbian feminist icon Monique Wittig was a co-founder of the Women’s Movement in France and was awarded the Prix Médicis for her first novel, The Opoponax. Decades ahead of her time, beginning in the 1960’s, Wittig integrated innovative non-gendered pronouns into her writing.

Stating that “heterosexuality is a political regime,” a sex class system standing in the way of equity for everyone, Wittig was often misunderstood. Her lesbian point of view received such fierce resistance in feminist groups that it forced her to leave the movement she helped to create. This drove her to move to the United States with the love of her life, Sande Zeig.

In recent years, a fervent interest in Wittig’s work is having an inevitable resurgence including the city of Paris dedicating a garden to her memory. The Monique Wittig Papers are now available at the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library at Yale University.

Poster design Curious Sky. Photo Adele Prandini

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Wittig, Yes! Synopsis

Wittig Yes! introduces Wittig’s political, theoretical, and literary ideas through the creative collaborations with her partner Sande Zeig and a new generation of international academics and writers who articulate the foundations of her conceptual revolution. Zeig interweaves excerpts of work they developed over the years through archival film, photographs, personal notes, as well as theatrical readings. We move with them from France, to Greece, California, and Arizona. The three decades of public and private archival materials unveil Monique Wittig not only as a revolutionary writer, thinker, and activist but also as a multifaceted individual with a profound compassion for others, a deep love of nature, and an exceptional sense of humor. She leaves a legacy that continues to have an impact on our current ideas of gender and political thought.

Our Crew

Sande Zeig- Director & Producer

Sande Zeig has directed and produced seven films including Central Park, premiered at the Sundance, 1994; The Girl, based on a story by Monique Wittig, 2001, premiered at the Toronto and Berlin Film Festivals;  Soul Masters, 2008; Apache 8, broadcast  on PBS, 2011; Sister Jaguar’s Journey, 2015;  The Living Saint of Thailand, 2019; and Firelighters: Fire Is Medicine to be broadcast on PBS  November 2024. 

Zeig collaborated with Monique Wittig on a book, a play, and a film.

Anne-Charlotte Gourraud, Producer

Anne-Charlotte Gourraud is a journalist and documentary filmmaker. She joined the production company Hikari in 2019 and produces social and investigative documentaries for France Télévisions and Arte.

Victoria Westover, Producer

Victoria Westover was the Director of the UA Hanson FilmTV Institute and Baltimore Film Forum. She is the co-director of Cinema Tucsón in partnership with New-York based Cinema Tropical. Her directing credits include the documentary Final Vows; her producing credits include the feature The Wall and documentaries Firelighters: Fire is Medicine; The Music Never Ends, Almost an Island, Hippie Family Values, and Apache 8.

George Lechaptois, Director of Photography

Originally from Chile, Lechaptois moved to France in 1983 to attend the Louis-Lumière school. Lechaptois’s more than 60 credits include Rebecca Zlowtowski’s Other People’s Children, 2022; André Téchiné, Les Pieds Sur Terre by 2022;  Matthieu Roze’s Azuro, based on the book by Marguerite Duras, 2022; and André Téchiné’s Soul Mates, 2023.

Jillian Moul, Editor

Jillian Moul is a Primetime Emmy Award nominee and a member of the American Cinema Editors. She edited the feature documentary Fame High with Oscar-nominated director Scott Hamilton Kennedy and three feature films with director Jon M. Chu for Paramount, Universal, Blumhouse and Open Road. Moul was lead editor on L Word Mississippi: Hate the Sin, a documentary that won the GLAAD Award for Outstanding Documentary.

Wendy Blackstone, Composer

Wendy Blackstone is an award-winning composer. Wendy has scored over 140 films and TV shows, ten of which have won or been nominated for an Academy Award. She is the first woman signed to CAA and one of the first women invited to the music branch of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences.