{"id":18788,"date":"2013-11-13T17:45:34","date_gmt":"2013-11-13T17:45:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jomec.co.uk\/altcardiff\/?p=18788"},"modified":"2013-11-13T17:45:34","modified_gmt":"2013-11-13T17:45:34","slug":"cardiff-character-jay-bedwani","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cardiffjournalism.co.uk\/altcardiff\/2013\/11\/13\/cardiff-character-jay-bedwani\/","title":{"rendered":"Cardiff character: Jay Bedwani"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jay Bedwani is this year<\/span>\u2019<\/span>s winner of the Iris Prize at Cardiff<\/span>\u2019<\/span>s annual international gay and lesbian film festival. Since claiming the award just four weeks ago, Jay has had his first taste of celebrity. <\/span>\u201cIt\u2019<\/span>s been nice<\/span>,\u201d said Jay, blushing, \u201cturns out it<\/span>\u2019<\/span>s not so hard to talk about yourself.<\/span>\u201d<\/p>\n

Jay\u2019<\/span>s winning film <\/span>My Mother<\/span><\/em>is a powerful profile documentary featuring Gustavo, a Mexican man who lives life both as himself and also as his alter ego Donna, in <\/span>an attempt to feel closer to his late mother. Jay met Gustavo whilst volunteering in California, where he spends a lot of his time. <\/span>\u201cIt started as a photography project but I <\/span>soon realised that Gustavo had <\/span>so much to <\/span>say that I thought I<\/span>\u2019<\/span>d experiment with film.<\/span>\u201d Jay smiled as he recalled the time he spent filming, <\/span>\u201cIt was such a genuine project, just spending time with a really interesting and very sweet, intelligent guy.<\/span>\u201d<\/p>\n

Born and raised in Cardiff, Jay originally trained as a photographer. <\/span>My Mother<\/span><\/em>is his first documentary and <\/span>won him his first international award, which he modestly acknowledges,<\/span> \u201cIt\u2019<\/span>s been really inspiring and nice to know I<\/span>\u2019<\/span>m sort of on the right track<\/span>.”<\/p>\n

Cardiff’s Iris Festival is growing every year and has built a prestigious reputation. “Having an international festival in Cardiff is really great,” said Jay, “I didn\u2019t feel I had to win, just being involved was really good.<\/span>\u201d<\/p>\n

Being gay in Cardiff<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Jay, 35, came out in his early 20s. <\/span>\u201cI\u2019<\/span>m very lucky<\/span> to have a great family,\u201d Jay said laughing, \u201cit was a slight anti-climax.<\/span>\u201d<\/p>\n

Visiting San Francisco for the first time opened Jay\u2019s eyes to a more diverse and dynamic city, completely different to where he grew up in Cardiff. <\/span>\u201cIf I had a boyfriend here, I<\/span>\u2019<\/span>d be affectionate but not as I would in San Francisco. Holding hands <\/span>on Queen Street is fine and I probably wouldn\u2019t get any comments but I would still feel I was making a statement.<\/span>\u201d<\/p>\n

A handsome young man with defined facial hair, Jay recalled the first time he took his brother to San Francisco and his reaction to the high percentage of gay men compared to Cardiff. <\/span>\u201cHe said <\/span>\u2018oh my god, are they really all gay? They are so handsome and they all have beards!’<\/span>\u201d<\/p>\n

Hosting international gay and lesbian events in Cardiff is a step in the right direction for Cardiff\u2019s gay community. \u201cI think recently there has been a lot more happening,\u201d said Jay, \u201cbut when I grew up here, I struggled. We didn\u2019t really have things like this going on.\u201d<\/p>\n

What the future holds<\/strong><\/p>\n

After such a successful transition from photography to film, Jay is experimenting with ideas for another short profile documentary filmed either in California, Australia or here in Cardiff.\u00a0 But he is not ready to leave Gustavo just yet, \u201cI\u2019d really love to develop My Mother<\/em> into a feature, I think it would really stand up to that as a long term project but we will just have to wait and see.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Jay

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jay Bedwani snaps up the 2013 Iris Prize for best short film<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":252,"featured_media":18808,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[482,3285,3286,3287],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-18788","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","tag-gay","tag-iris-prize","tag-jay-bedwani","tag-lesbian"],"yoast_head":"\nCardiff character: Jay Bedwani - alt.cardiff<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/cardiffjournalism.co.uk\/altcardiff\/2013\/11\/13\/cardiff-character-jay-bedwani\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Cardiff character: Jay Bedwani - 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