Penny Lane

Years in residence at Wex: 2017

Normal Appearances
(2018)

A growing force in the field of nonfiction filmmaking, Penny Lane has won accolades at film festivals around the US including the Best Documentary prize at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival for her feature, Nuts!

With Artist Residency Award assistance, Lane returns with her latest project to the issue of reproductive rights, the focus of her 2005 documentary short Abortion Stories. Currently titled Norma, the feature-length work will explore the life of Norma McCorvey, the woman chosen by chance to be the most famous plaintiff in American history. As “Jane Roe” in the case of Roe v. Wade, McCorvey was cast as the lead in an epic and deeply divisive historical drama. Then, after becoming an icon of the pro-choice movement, McCorvey switched sides and became an outspoken opponent of abortion rights. Relying on archival material as in her 2013 feature debut, Our Nixon, and including excerpts from McCorvey’s two published memoirs, Lane traces McCorvey’s struggle to reveal the real-life story behind a legal fiction.

Lane will also utilize the Film/Video Studio for the sound design and mix of her new experimental short, Normal Appearances, which explores the strange ritualistic structure of the reality dating show The Bachelor.