Dr. Welch Interviewed for New Documentary on Gene Stratton Porter
On Tuesday, April 14th, our backyard became a studio with lights, a camera, and the action being me being interviewed about what work was like for women in early Hollywood.
Emmy award-winning documentarian Todd Gould, whose other PBS documentaries involve Indiana-based stories of people and events that influenced the world, including Ernie Pyle and Gennett Records,
is working on a new documentary covering the life of environmentalist, novelist, and filmmaker Gene Stratton Porter. Gould is hoping to shed light on this early female film pioneer, who was also an extremely successful author of fiction and nonfiction works, nature photographer, environmental activist and feminist who worked with the suffrage movement.
By Gspmemorial – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, Link
When he contacted me, it was maddening to learn there was yet another woman from the early 1900s whose name I had never seen in history books, yet she had the prescience to recognize that making movies of her books would increase their value so she built a film studio in Hollywood to do exactly that. At the same time, she was calling for caring for our environment long before Rachel Carson wrote Silent Spring in 1962. Gene was out photographing birds and nature, and drawing attention to our effect on the planet 50 years earlier.
Gould and his local crew set up in our plant-filled backyard as he wanted a natural setting for as many of his interviews as possible. Then we chatted about the many ways women helped found Hollywood, how tough that work was, and how the studio system mitigated women’s progress in the industry, which is one explanation for why so many people don’t know women like Gene Stratton Porter. Thanks to Todd’s documentary, soon they will, and I’m very proud to play a small part in bringing her work – and the work of many other early female screenwriters to greater audiences.
The documentary is slated to premiere in November 2026 (probably sometime around Thanksgiving time)