Uniting Art, Activism and Awareness: Actress and Filmmaker Giovannie Espiritu receives Honorable Mention at Outfest Fusion

Actress Giovannie Espiritu is no stranger to the Outfest Film Festival, Los Angeles’ largest LGBTQ film festival. One of her first collaborations with director Florencia Manovil, “Fiona’s Script,” a dramatic feature about a young bisexual woman, was screened at the Directors Guild of America nearly ten years ago. (In that film, Espiritu played the best friend to the lead, and earned a Best Supporting Actress nomination alongside Academy Award nominees Alfre Woodard and Amy Irving at the Method Fest Film Festival.)

Over the years, Espiritu has had other projects screen with Outfest, but this year is the first time that she has received accolades from the festival as a writer and director. She entered her short film, “Ultra-Feminist,” in Outfest Fusion’s One Minute Movie Contest in the “micro-aggression” category. Espiritu wrote the short in response to the online trolling that she received for her stance regarding equality for women in the workplace and calling out sexist behavior. Because it was a last minute entry, Espiritu was surprised at the closing night ceremony when Producers Quincy and Deondre Gossfield called her up to receive an Honorable Mention out of nearly twenty films.

While some people would caution artists to shy away from divisive work, Espiritu has carved out a niche tackling sensitive issues and fighting for the underdog.

Her first film, “American Yearbook,” directed by Brian Ging, dealt with the controversial topic of school shootings, gun control, and mental health. She directed and performed in Eve Ensler’s “The Vagina Monologues,” at the prestigious Herbst Theater in San Francisco at a time when saying the word “vagina” and talking about domestic violence was taboo in the Filipino community. She was then awarded a Certificate of Recognition, along with then-District Attorney Kamala Harris, by the Filipino Women’s Network for shedding light on domestic violence in the Asian American community.

Her current series on Amazon, “Dyke Central,” is praised in many LGBTQ publications such as BUST Magazine, CURVE Magazine, and Buzzfeed as a top series to watch for the diverse portrayal of the LGBTQ community and shedding light on issues such as mental health, employment issues for transpersons, and substance abuse. In the series, she plays Gin, a genderqueer Filipina who is the lothario of the group.

“Art and storytelling have been used to shift society over many generations,” Espiritu explains. “Filmmaking forces people to see things from someone else’s perspective — someone that can be totally and completely different from you — and teaches us empathy. It helps people understand and, hopefully, love one another regardless of belief systems, race, and orientation. That’s the change that I want to be part of — remembering how essentially at the core, we all are human. We’ve just forgotten how to connect with each other.”

She is currently in post-production on a short that she wrote and directed called, “Ally3000,” and has several projects on the film festival circuit including, “D-Railed,” where she plays a lowly train employee, Jackie, with sci-fi icon Lance Henricksen as her boss.

Giovannie Espiritu Founder, HollywoodActorsWorkshop.com

Official website: giovannie.com