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Loving people that are different from us is the only way forward  Lady Gaga

A documentary by Daniel Jungle and Sam Pollard on the life and legacy of Carl Bean (1944-2021).

Through an engaging rotoscope animation, footage, vintage photographs, interviews with music legends such as Lady Gaga, Dionne Warwick, Estelle Brown, Questlove, Iris Gordy among others, starring Billy Porter and Carl Bean himself,  we learn about African American singer, activist and minister Bean and in the film we are driven through his life story and legacy.

Raised into a middle-class family and living in Baltimore, Maryland, his life evolves and illustrates Carl´s way with the privilege of watching and listening to him sitting on a sofá, remembering and sharing a fragment of history and humanity.

At the rythm of  Frankie Lymon & The Teenagers´ Why Do Fools Fall in Love‘, young and openly gay Carl walks on the street sharing the fixation on his first crush that lived across the street,  he also tells how he was sexually abused by his uncle, his father´s brother and how being accepted at the Providence Baptist Church choir was a revelatory salvation for him and his attachment to the Gospel.

A suicidal attempt took Carl to the hospital, his birth mother worked there and took care of him, and helped to remove the idea of fear he had,  making clear there was no reason he couldn’t reach whatever his dream was.  Living with his mother  took him away of his previous home and thrown him into a  surviving mood and also meeting people, living a different life that prepare him for what was to come later in New York City.

Carl was named Baby Boy in his years of The Gospel Wonders, singing since then message music and writing songs of love and unity.  It took a little time to  mighty Motown Records to make contact with him to record the album All We Need is Love. 

Decades later the song I Was Born This Way with lyrics by Bunny Jones, and music by Chris Spierer refering to carefree, and feeling fredom was a sensation in Carl Bean´s Disco version, a change agent in society and an anthem. Thebfilm includes a reference to the Disco Demolition NIght in 1979 Chicago.

In the decade of 1980 Carl Bean became an activist helping to deal with AIDS epidemic, and he founded  the Minority AIDS Project in LA, supporting African American men and/or burying  the deas.  His love and sense of unity materialized in him becoming a Minister and founding the  Unity Fellowship Church  “God is love and love is for everyone.” i It opened in Los Angeles in 1985, and was welcoming for lesbians, gays and bisexuals.

Decades latet Lady Gaga  found inspiration in the song and made it her own Born This Way in 2011,  as we all know.

This film which premiere at Tribeca´25  is a tribute to Carl Bean snd shows how he  lived his life