Broderick Fox’s award-winning narrative, experimental, and documentary works present challenging, socially relevant issues through accessible, character-driven storytelling and have screened in over 50 international festivals.
He is also a college professor and scholar, whose writing and teaching are committed to questions of social justice, narrative exploration, and the democratizing potentials of digital media. He has recently published two articles of particular relevance to Zen & the Art of Dying: the first explores autobiographical video as pain management and the second proposes collaborative documentary video as a tool to engage dying and death.
Fox’s first documentary Tak for Alt: Survival of a Human Sprit (1999), which he co-directed with Laura Bialis and Sarah Levy, won a Dore Schary Award and received special recognition from the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. Love, Death, & Cars (1999) premiered at the Palm Springs International Film Festival and aired on U.S. public television. Things Girls Do… (2001) premiered at Outfest and continues to play and stream internationally. I Knew Him (2007) was a finalist for the Iris Prize, the world’s largest prize for work representing or advocating for LGBT individuals and was selected by RAINN.org (the Rape and Incest National Network in the US) as an official PSA campaign video. Home (2009) premiered in Berlin at the Globians World and Culture Documentary Festival and now streams, along with other titles on Fandor.
Fox’s feature documentary The Skin I’m In (2012) had its world premiere at the Byron Bay International Film Festival, with the screening doubling as a fundraiser for ACON Northern Rivers, Australia’s leading LGBT health services organization. It was at this screening that Fox met Zenith Virago. While in Australia, Fox had the pleasure of being a guest on ABC Radio’s Conversations with Richard Fidler. The film won Best Feature and Best in Fest at the Tattoo Arts Film Festival, was a Juror’s Pick at the Victoria International Film Festival, and a Best Documentary Score Finalist at the Park City Film Music Festival. After a festival run spanning 19 cities and 11 countries, the film was released globally in 2014 in conjunction with an associated transmedia Web initiative.
Fox was one of 12 California artists awarded a 2014 Artistic Innovation Grant from the Center for Cultural Innovation in support of Zen & the Art of Dying. He is the James Irvine Professor of Media Arts & Culture at Occidental College in Los Angeles, teaching courses in both theory and production. His book, Documentary Media: History – Theory – Practice is out now in its second edition through Routledge Press.