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Realness is a theme within ballroom culture depicted in the film Paris is Burning. To “walk real” means to embody the look, attitude, and guise of a person you are not; oftentimes in the context of the film, a white, straight, well off man or woman. Fundamentally, this gives you the legitimacy of being acceptable by society, and many critics upon Paris is Burning’s release hailed drag culture as proof of identity fluidity.,

But others pointed out the “realness” is questionable, because it illustrates standards set by a dominant class and culture. In other words, identity fluidity isn’t truly the case because people “conform” to the social norms established.

While doing research for Paris is Burning, I came across two articles that have very different takes on the film’s interpretation of realism: Phillip Brian Harper’s “The Subversive Edge: Paris Is Burning, Social Critique, and the Limits of Subjective Agency” and Chandan Reddy’s “Home, Houses, Nonidentity: Paris Is Burning” Both take a stance criticizing the virtue of “realness” portrayed in the film, but they differ in the perspective in why people in ballroom culture use it.

Harper argues that realness in the context of the film is manipulated and controlled in a way that maintains a strict social hierarchy. When people enter the ballroom and “walk real,” they are emulating identity rather than creating identity; thus adhering to the “white, straight, and wealthy” ideals that are strived towards. As such, Paris is Burning gives an appearance of being empowering, but it is the very thing that keeps people disempowered.

Reddy takes a different approach; rather than what “realness” limits, he is more interested in what realness reveals and how it is used in ballroom culture. He argues that ballroom culture is aware of the social construct of “realism,” and instead emulation exposes how fake “realism” is; how a social hierarchy is nothing more than an act. In this way, ballroom functions as a way of cultural expression rather than cultural assimilation.

I think these two interpretation speak to the nature of the documentary itself; both can be true. Jennie Livingston, the film’s director, is a white woman, which comes at contrast to ballroom’s black and hispanic roots. The film is made for white audiences; ballroom is presented as a new concept, and much of the film covers topics people within ballroom culture would be very familiar with already. As such, the discrepancy between the white filmmakers and the black, hispanic, and queer community creates different interpretations between the creative choices used and even the nature of the interviews given. In other words, the dream to live up to “white” expectations shared by many in the ballroom community may not be as pronounced as the film presents it to be. I think that its impossible to explain a culture and its significance through media; you have to actually live it.

In the film, Dorian Corey explained that in a ball, “you can be anything you want. You’re not really an executive, but you’re looking like an executive. And therefore you’re showing the straight world that I can be an executive. If I had the opportunity, I could be one. Because I can look like one.”

Throughout Paris Is Burning (1990), the idea of complete replication, or “blending in,” is emphasized, with individuals receiving perfect scores when they completely embody the role they present in the ballroom. One of the main ideas in the film is how the ballroom community uses fashion and voguing to inhabit roles that society usually denies them. When participants walk in categories such as “Executive Realness” or “Town and Country”, they are not simply showing off clothing, they are performing access to power, wealth, and respectability. These performances revealed that fashion is never just about what someone wears, rather, it is about who has permission to appear legitimate while wearing it. Given this, at first, I believed drag was an act of imitation (a way to blend into a higher social class) with emphasis being placed on fashion’s power coming from the privilege of the wearer rather than creativity itself. However, throughout the film, my interpretation changed.

In the film, a participant can look like a Wall Street executive, yet outside the ballroom, society still views them as poor and queer. Their outer fashion appears convincing, yet it does not grant the privilege attached to that image. This highlights the “normalized” idea that the value of fashion depends on who wears it and the access that person holds.

What makes Paris Is Burning interesting is how this dynamic is transformed. Within the ballroom, fashion no longer depends on external validation. Fashion now becomes a language of self-definition and freedom. As Corey explains, “In the ballroom, you can be anything you want.” The act of performance turns fashion into something liberating rather than aspirational. Drag emerges as a form of expression that contradicts the belief that fashion requires social status to hold meaning. It demonstrates that confidence and creativity, not privilege, give style its significance.

I explored this idea/theme further through reading a piece by The Criterion Collection titled “Paris Is Burning: The Fire This Time” written by Michelle Parkerson. Parkerson writes that the ballroom is “a world in which style becomes survival,” and within this space, self-presentation operates as a “radical act”. The balls create an alternate reality where individuals excluded from the hierarchy can redefine beauty, gender, and success. Fashion, detached from wealth or whiteness, becomes a language of resilience, artistry, and self-identification.

The ballroom community and drag as an art show that fashion holds value when it becomes a tool of identity rather than a marker of privilege. Drag transforms clothing into language, movement into protest, and presentation into truth. Through performance, individuals claim visibility and power in a world that refuses to grant it. Fashion in this context no longer depends on wealth or position. It becomes an act of existence.

Source: https://www.criterion.com/current/posts/6832-paris-is-burning-the-fire-this-time?srsltid=AfmBOornHPZpxL81P94ZA5YgxfPWpz2L8nkkNcF_IdYNO5G8XHxtyQJe

Alex Gibney is a documentary film director and producer who worked on multiple big projects throughout his career. In this interview, he shows a little bit of the behind the scenes and the thoughts and challenges of making a documentary.

While watching the interview, I realized how important editing is to a documentary. I’m used to thinking about scripted movies, where the film is mostly captured on set. The editing for those is more like putting a puzzle together when you already have the picture on the box. But for documentaries, this is very different. The story and the film itself are created in the editing room. It feels like the story is actually found and built from the ground up.

Gibney says that he often discovered new ideas and thoughts when reviewing footage in the editing room. He also highlights the flexibility of documentary work, explaining that because the teams are small, they can easily go film new material if they discover a party of the story they want to tell is missing in the edit. That kind of flexibility is amazing and seems vital for this kind of work.

According to Gibney, editing plays such a major role because it guides the audience towards the point of view of the author. It’s how they take all that raw footage and shape it into the final message.
This is connected to a major challenge:
dealing with people in the story you disagree with. Gibney talked about balancing the obligation he feels towards his subjects with his primary obligation, which is to the audience. He was clear that he’s not there to make a “commercial” for someone, especially if they aren’t being truthful. A directors job is to find and convey the truth.