The founding of amfAR, the Foundation for AIDS Research, by Hollywood icon the late Elizabeth Taylor and research scientist Dr. Mathilde Krim is an inspiring story that needed to be told, says legendary fashion designer and amfAR board chairman Kenneth Cole. Cole attended the 2013 Sundance Film Festival for screenings of “The Battle of amfAR,” a film directed by Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman.
“The power of this forum of independent storytelling is so significant and you can reach audiences in so many important and meaningful ways, and you can tell stories bigger than soundbites,” Cole told genConnect. Watch Kenneth Cole describe the film and the inspiring worldwide work of amfAR:
Kenneth Cole
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Cole describes amfAR’s progress in the decades since its founding as “profound.”
“I just consider myself fortunate to play a role in guiding it and looking for ways to use and leverage its resources to creatively reach higher and accomplish more,” he says. “amfAR today has been the underlying funding of four of the six drugs that are keeping millions of people alive.”
Cole says he knew Sundance legends Epstein and Friedman, who directed “The Times of Harvey Milk,” among other major AIDS-related documentaries, were the perfect filmmakers to bring amfAR’s story to cinema audiences.
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“They understand the issues and they’re close to it and they’re passionate about it,” Cole says. “I helped them reach out and connect with other articulate and important people in this journey that we’ve embarked upon and this story got told.”
Still of Elizabeth Taylor in ‘The Battle of amFAR’
Cole says “The Battle of amfAR” reveals how two remarkable women founded an organization that is at the forefront of a cure for HIV/AIDS.
“But even if we had a cure today, there’s an estimated 34 million people living with the virus,” he says “Drugs and treatments are not accessible to the far majority of those. We have to figure out how to treat everybody. It’s going to take resources and going to take time.”
View even more film festival interviews with actors, directors, musicians and celebrities on genConnect’s Sundance Festival Playlist on YouTube.
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