Bio - C.A. Griffith

C.A. Griffith came out of the independent film community in New York. In 1991, she became the first Black woman to gain membership as a First Assistant Cameraperson in the International Association of Theatrical Stage Employees Cameraman's union. She is a Cinematographer, Director/Producer and Editor, as well as an award-winning filmmaker and writer. Her film credits include music videos from Tracy Chapman to Depeche Mode, and Public Enemy to The Rolling Stones; documentaries such as Eyes on the Prize, Making of Do the Right Thing, and A Litany for Survival: The Life and Work of Audre Lorde; "indie" feature films from Juice to Del Otro Lado; an award winning short, Border.Line...Family Pictures, and Mountains That Take Wing -- winner of the St. Clair Bourne Award for documentary film at the San Francisco Black Film Festival and the MADA Award (Make A Difference Award) of the COMMFFEST Global Community Film Festival in Toronto. Her short screenplay, Blues for the Sea won the Martha Muñoz Award of the Latino Screenplay Competition. The Muñoz is a "special award honoring a unique portrayal of the Latino struggle." An early draft of the adapted feature script made her a finalist for the 2010 Sundance Screenwriter's Lab. Crystal’s publications appear in Filming Difference, Black Feminist Cultural Criticism: Classic Readings, The Wild Good: Lesbian Photographs and Writings on Love as well as numerous journals. Crystal currently teaches at Arizona State University in the School of Theatre & Film. She is collaborating with Professor H. L. T. Quan on their second feature-length documentary, América's Home, a film about gentrification, empire and popular resistance in Puerto Rico.