10 Facts About Danielle Lessovitz

Danielle Lessovitz is an American film director, producer, and screenwriter.

Danielle Lessovitz began her career in 2008, releasing several short films before her feature directorial debut Port Authority, which premiered at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival's Un Certain Regard section.

Danielle Lessovitz has screened her films at more than 100 film festivals worldwide.

Danielle Lessovitz grew up in Kansas City during the 1990s, but is currently based in New York City.

In 2012, Danielle Lessovitz made the short The Earthquake, written in 2010 after reading about Haitian communities in Queens experiencing loss from afar after the 2010 Haiti earthquake.

From this film, Danielle Lessovitz was honored with a New Filmmaker Award from the Philadelphia Jewish Film Society, Best Hartland short at the Kansas City Film Festival, and the Ben Lazeroff Award for screenwriting.

Danielle Lessovitz co-executive produced the film with Charles de Rosen and worked as an artistic collaborator with de Fontenay in the writing process.

The film was executive produced by Martin Scorsese, who Danielle Lessovitz said she was scared to reveal the final product to, explaining that "to feel like you have one of the most if not the most important American auteurs opening up his wisdom and his mentorship to you is surreal".

Danielle Lessovitz has said that she knew of ball culture from having seen Paris Is Burning as a film student, but did not know that it was still around in the 2010s until she was invited to one while in a crisis after her father's suicide; watching people vogueing gave her "respite" in this time, and speaking to drag families helped her gain a fresh understanding of family structures.

The film confronts Paul's identity as a white person, something that IndieWire's Jude Dry said Danielle Lessovitz "clearly gave a lot of thought"; interviewed by the outlet from Cannes, she said:.