Every Body
Directed by Julie Cohen. Performances by River Gallo, Alicia Roth Weigel, Sean Saifa Wall. Focus Features, 2022. Rated R. Documentary. 92 minutes
From Academy Award-nominated and Emmy-winning filmmaker Julie Cohen and in partnership with NBC News Studios, Every Body (2023) is a revelatory investigation of the lives of intersex people. The film tells the stories of three individuals who have moved from childhoods marked by shame, secrecy, and non-consensual surgeries to thriving adulthoods after each decided to set aside medical advice to keep their bodies a secret and instead came out as their authentic selves.
Actor and screenwriter River Gallo (they/them), political consultant Alicia Roth Weigel (she/they), and Ph.D. student Sean Saifa Wall (he/him) are now leaders in a fast-growing global movement advocating for greater understanding of the intersex community and an end to unnecessary surgeries. Woven into the story is a stranger-than-fiction case of medical abuse, featuring exclusive footage from the NBC News archives, which helps explain the modern-day treatment of intersex people.