When you create a style of storytelling that merges your life with fiction, you need to give it a name. What better name to describe the works of filmmaker, scholar, and trailblazer in Black queer cinema than the Dunyementary? Cheryl Dunye first burst onto the scene with her groundbreaking 1996 debut feature The Watermelon Woman, becoming the first openly out Black lesbian to direct a narrative feature. A witty, self-reflexive exploration of erasure in film history, this first Dunyementary was added to the National Film Registry in 2021. Her recent work has brought her distinct style to episodes of Queen Sugar, Lovecraft Country, Dear White People, and The Umbrella Academy. Ms. Cheryl (as she invited me to call her) is the head of Jingletown Films and serves as a professor at San Francisco State University. I got to catch up with her briefly between meetings this spring. Selected FilmographyThe Owls (2010) My Baby's Daddy (2004) Stranger Inside (2001) The Watermelon Woman (1996) The Early Films of Cheryl Dunye (1994) Lovecraft Country (2020) Queen Sugar (2017-2019)