Replay: In ‘Disclosure,’ Laverne Cox and Sam Feder explore trans representation in media

Hollywood’s depictions of trans people — and the impact of those portrayals on the trans audience — is the subject of the 2020 Netflix documentary “Disclosure,” which is now a finalist for a Peabody Award. The film draws on decades of archival footage, from Bugs Bunny cartoons to “Yentl” to “Silence of the Lambs.”

This week, The Business revisits a conversation with “Disclosure” director Sam Feder and executive producer Laverne Cox, who’s also a subject of the film.

Even with limited representation on screen, Cox says growing up, she found herself through watching movies — and possibly not films one might expect.

“I don’t know if the filmmakers had a Black trans, gender nonconforming kid in Mobile, Alabama, in mind when they conceived of ‘Yentl.’ I don’t know if I was the target demographic for that.”

Cox says finding similarities between oneself and a character on screen “is something that LGBTQI people have been doing for a very long time.”

Feder and Cox also discuss hiring an almost all-trans crew to make their film and the mentorship program that was created through the production of “Disclosure.”