LGBT Center and Gerontology Institute Partner for Screening and Discussion

By Dave Maley, October 10, 2018

Documentary “Bruce & Daryl” highlights gay male couple’s relationship.

A documentary made by a pair of Ithaca College students will be screened as part of a collaborative presentation by the college’s Gerontology Institute and Center for LGBT Education, Outreach, and Services. Titled “As Long As We’re Going Through It Together, I’m Content: Aging and the Experience of a Gay Male Couple,” the presentation will be held on Monday, Oct. 22, at 7 p.m. in the Campus Center’s Emerson Suites. It is free and open to the public.

The short film “Bruce & Daryl” highlights the relationship between Bruce Henderson, professor of communication studies at Ithaca College; and Daryl Bem, professor emeritus of psychology at Cornell University, as they ruminate on their life together through love, loss and academia.

The screening will be followed by remarks by the filmmakers, as well as by thoughts and reflections from Henderson and Bem on issues raised by the film. The event is intended to spark an engaging dialogue through an exploration of aging and relationships from a gay couple’s perspective.

“Bruce & Daryl” was co-directed and co-produced by junior Alisha Tamarchenko, who has a double major in documentary studies and anthropology; and senior Josh Jacobius, who is majoring in documentary studies with a minor in aging studies.

Henderson has taught at IC for over 30 years and is co-author of two textbooks in performance studies as well as co-editor of a collection of essays on disability and performance. His forthcoming textbook “Queer Studies: Beyond Binaries” is scheduled to be published by Harrington Park Press. His current research focuses on AIDS fiction published since the advent of HAART (Highly Active Antiretroviral Therapy) and the gay male comic novel, as well as on such individual literary figures as Flannery O’Connor, Saul Bellow and Philip Roth.

Bem taught social and personality psychology at Cornell for several decades. In addition to publishing many scholarly articles in social psychology, he is the author of the book “Beliefs, Attitudes, and Human Affairs” and was co-author of a best-selling textbook in introductory psychology. Currently, he does research on ESP phenomena. He has appeared on The Colbert Report and other media outlets, and is a long-time stage musician, specializing in ESP and mind-reading performances.

The presentation is part of the Gerontology Institute’s Distinguished Speaker Series and the LGBT Center’s Out of the Closet and Onto the Screen film series. For more information, visit Ithaca.edu/gerontology or Ithaca.edu/lgbt.