Contact information
Name:
Drew Swedberg
Phone:
610-330-3242
Email:
swedberd@lafayette.edu
When:
Tuesday, October 28, 2025 - 7:00pm - 9:30pm
Where:
Landis Cinema - Buck Hall - 219 N. 3rd Street
Presenter:
Director Contessa Gayles
Price:
Free
SONGS FROM THE HOLE (96m)
in-person with Director Contessa Gayles
FILM SYNOPSIS
At 15, he took a life. Three days later, his brother’s life was taken. A moving chronicle of forgiveness, family, and the transformative power of art, SONGS FROM THE HOLE weaves music and mixed-media storytelling into an innovative documentary visual album.
At 15, he took a life. Three days later, his brother’s life was taken. A moving chronicle of forgiveness, family, and the transformative power of art, SONGS FROM THE HOLE weaves music and mixed-media storytelling into an innovative documentary visual album.
Through clear-eyed narration and lyrical journal entries, incarcerated musician James “JJ’88” (abbrev: ‘88) Jacobs reveals his innermost struggles as a person who has both committed and experienced violent harm. While serving a double-life prison sentence, he searches for healing and peace as he comes of age in this documentary-musical odyssey composed behind bars.
In a unique creative process director Contessa Gayles (THE FEMINIST ON CELLBLOCK Y, THE DEBUTANTES) collaborated with protagonist/writer JJ’88 and producer/music producer richie reseda to interweave the collective storytelling of the film’s non-fiction participants, with imagined memories, dreams and spiritual dialogues set to JJ’88’s original music. The result is a powerful mix of truth-telling and dreaming that reveal the potential for healing and liberation within us all.
FILMMAKER BIO
CONTESSA GAYLES - Director, Producer, Director of Photography, Editor, Writer
Contessa Gayles makes films for the culture. She is an award-winning film director, writer, DP, editor and an Emmy-nominated producer. She tells stories about identity, community, coming of-age, liberation and the radical imagination. Contessa’s critically acclaimed feature documentary-visual album, SONGS FROM THE HOLE, world premiered at SXSW 2024, where it won the Audience Award, Visions category. The film has gone on to earn many accolades, including the 2024 Jury Prize for Best Documentary Feature at the BlackStar Film Festival, an IDA Award nomination for Best Music Documentary, and the 2025 Cinema Eye Honors Heterodox Award. Contessa premiered THE DEBUTANTES (Xumo) at the 2024 Tribeca Film Festival in documentary competition and her documentary short, FOUNDER GIRLS (BET), premiered at the 2023 Tribeca Film Festival. Contessa’s work has been supported by Impact Partners, Field of Vision, Sundance Institute, International Documentary Association, Artemis Rising Foundation, California Arts Council, DeNovo Initiative, Queen Latifah’s Queen Collective, and more. She was an SFFILM filmmaker in residence and has been awarded fellowships with the Film Independent/Netflix Amplifier fellowship, the Bay Area Video Coalition MediaMaker fellowship, the Firelight Documentary Lab, the Chicken & Egg (Egg)celerator Lab and the Open Society Foundations Soros Justice fellowship. She was named to DOC NYC’s 40 Under 40 list and is currently a Concordia fellow. Previously, she was on staff at CNN, where she directed, produced, shot and edited award-winning original series and documentaries, including the feature documentary, THE FEMINIST ON CELLBLOCK Y.
Contessa Gayles makes films for the culture. She is an award-winning film director, writer, DP, editor and an Emmy-nominated producer. She tells stories about identity, community, coming of-age, liberation and the radical imagination. Contessa’s critically acclaimed feature documentary-visual album, SONGS FROM THE HOLE, world premiered at SXSW 2024, where it won the Audience Award, Visions category. The film has gone on to earn many accolades, including the 2024 Jury Prize for Best Documentary Feature at the BlackStar Film Festival, an IDA Award nomination for Best Music Documentary, and the 2025 Cinema Eye Honors Heterodox Award. Contessa premiered THE DEBUTANTES (Xumo) at the 2024 Tribeca Film Festival in documentary competition and her documentary short, FOUNDER GIRLS (BET), premiered at the 2023 Tribeca Film Festival. Contessa’s work has been supported by Impact Partners, Field of Vision, Sundance Institute, International Documentary Association, Artemis Rising Foundation, California Arts Council, DeNovo Initiative, Queen Latifah’s Queen Collective, and more. She was an SFFILM filmmaker in residence and has been awarded fellowships with the Film Independent/Netflix Amplifier fellowship, the Bay Area Video Coalition MediaMaker fellowship, the Firelight Documentary Lab, the Chicken & Egg (Egg)celerator Lab and the Open Society Foundations Soros Justice fellowship. She was named to DOC NYC’s 40 Under 40 list and is currently a Concordia fellow. Previously, she was on staff at CNN, where she directed, produced, shot and edited award-winning original series and documentaries, including the feature documentary, THE FEMINIST ON CELLBLOCK Y.
SERIES DESCRIPTION
REVOLUTIONS, a bicentennial, interdisciplinary documentary screening series at Lafayette, will feature public screenings, talkbacks, and classroom engagements with contemporary filmmakers and their impactful films.
FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC
This series is supported in part by the Bicentennial Academic Fund.
This screening is funded in part by the R.K. Laros Foundation.
Sponsored by:
Film and Media Studies