Angela Shelton
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| Angela Shelton | |
|---|---|
| Born | December 5, 1972 Asheville, North Carolina |
Angela Shelton (born December 5, 1972) is an American screenwriter, actress, and documentary film producer, best known for the film Tumbleweeds and the documentary Searching for Angela Shelton, which she wrote, directed, and edited. She has also just released her book, Finding Angela Shelton: The True Story of One Woman's Triumph over Sexual Abuse.
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[edit] Early career
Shelton was a co-screenwriter (with then-husband Gavin O'Connor) and executive producer for the 1999 film Tumbleweeds, based upon her experiences with her serial-marrying mother, to whom she was returned after being in foster care. She also has acted in the films Comfortably Numb (1995), The Shrink Is In (2001), The Big Time (2002 television movie), and The Safe Side, a 2004 instructional video. On television, Shelton has appeared in Pacific Blue, Chicago Hope, and Becker.
[edit] Searching for Angela Shelton
After her parents divorced, Shelton lived with her father, stepmother, stepbrother, and stepsister in North Carolina. She and her siblings were sexually molested by her father and step mother and eventually removed from their care and placed in foster care. The events in her childhood inspired her to make a documentary.
In 2001, Shelton undertook the production of a documentary in which she travelled the United States interviewing 40 of the 76 anonymous women, who shared her name, whom she found while searching the Internet.
Shelton found that many of the women whom she interviewed had either been raped, beaten, or molested. Shelton, inspired to document her quest to find the women and to catalogue their traumas, rented a motor home and spent 57 days traversing the United States, spending nearly $300,000, some of which was donated by personal friends and family and professional contacts. Shelton also confronted her father, her own abuser, during the production of the film, meeting with him on Father's Day 2001 to discuss her molestation. It took three years and three different editors to complete the film. In the end Shelton edited the film herself.
Shelton chose to promote and distribute the film independently, notably appearing in 2004 on the American television programs 48 Hours and The Oprah Winfrey Show. Since then, in an effort to bring attention to domestic violence, especially when perpetrated against women and children, Shelton has travelled the United States speaking at colleges and universities and film festivals. In April of 2006, an edited version aired on the cable television channel Lifetime, as part of their campaign to end violence against women. Presently, Shelton presents the film and gives speeches at colleges and universities across the country in an effort to end violence against women.
[edit] Awards
The film won 12 awards,[1] including audience awards for best documentary at the 2004 Asheville and Austin Film Festivals. The mayor of Asheville, proclaimed November 27, 2004 Angela Shelton Day [2].
- Newport Beach Festival - Best Independent Documentary
- Durango Film Festival - Audience Award
- Asheville Film Festival - Best Documentary
- Sonoma Valley Film Festival - Audience Award
- Zoie Fest - Best Documentary
- Memphis International Film Festival - Best Documentary
- Austin Film Festival - Best Documentary
[edit] Angela Shelton Foundation
In response to the acclaim received by her documentary, Shelton founded the Angela Shelton Foundation [3] to support financially and link discursively worldwide domestic and sexual abuse prevention organizations. The Angela Shelton Foundation store was recently opened, and 100% of its proceeds go to the foundation. Various apparel and merchandise are available for purchase.
[edit] Finding Angela Shelton
In April of 2008, she released her book, Finding Angela Shelton: The True Story of One Woman's Triumph over Sexual Abuse. The book is not based upon her movie, although it does run parallel to it. In it, Angela shares how making the film forced her to face her past. She wrote the book to call for a healing revolution after seeing so many people in pain. The movie breaks the silence and the book breaks the cycle.
[edit] Other Accolades
- Angela Shelton was presented with the Voice of Courage award from Darkness to Light.
- The mayor of Asheville, NC signed a proclamation making April 29, 2008 ANGELA SHELTON DAY in honor of abuse survivors.
- Angela was also presented with the Humanitarian Award from the Cultural Enrichment Committee at Umpqua Community College in Oregon.
