The Watermelon Woman directed by Cheryl Dunye raises questions of authenticity, visibility and authorship as Dunye plays Cheryl, a young lesbian filmmaker in search of a forgotten Black actress from the 1930’s credited only as ‘The Watermelon Woman’. As her research progresses and her love life gets complicated, uncomfortable truths emerge. The film is a fiction, but Cheryl Dunye says, “Sometimes you have to create your own history.”

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The Watermelon Woman 
dir. Cheryl Dunye

The Watermelon Woman directed by Cheryl Dunye raises questions of authenticity, visibility and authorship as Dunye plays Cheryl, a young lesbian filmmaker in search of a forgotten Black actress from the 1930’s credited only as ‘The Watermelon Woman’. As her research progresses and her love life gets complicated, uncomfortable truths emerge. The film is a fiction, but Cheryl Dunye says, “Sometimes you have to create your own history.”