In Conversation with Filmmaker Sarah Gibson

“She's a renaissance woman” — The documentary filmmaker on working with Stormy Daniels and telling stories that matter.

by Joe Mastromatteo

Published on August 28, 2024

In 2021, Sarah Gibson was on the freeway wrestling with the daily headlines about Stormy Daniels. When her feelings boiled over, she pulled over and texted Daniels, offering to tell her story on screen. The two had previously met in 2019 while working on a comedy project, and Daniels was a vocal fan of Gibson’s previous work on the documentary Britney vs Spears.

After Gibson reached out, Daniels was intrigued. “She’s like: ‘Do you think you could make a film like that about me?’” recalls the director when speaking to RANGE.

In 2024, Gibson’s feature-length documentary STORMY is a reality. The film marks the latest entry in a steadily growing resume of social justice documentaries by the Toronto-born director. Her film career began in the early 2000s with Small Town Gay Bar, a look at coming out in the deep south.

“I invested my very modest retirement savings that I’d saved up in my late 20s at that point,” says Gibson. A Simon Fraser University graduate, Gibson had initially worked in advertising. After the success of Small Town Gay Bar, which included a Sundance nod, Gibson didn’t look back at the “soulless” advertising industry.

Now residing in Los Angeles, Gibson recalls the momentum that followed her after turning to a career as a documentarian. “We were still distributing documentaries in the mail at the time,” says Gibson of her early docs. “Streaming giants really revolutionized the documentary business and made it a lot more accessible. There’s been this appetite for documentaries.”

Gibson has focused her body of work on social issues. “I’m always looking for stories with social impact because that to me is the most rewarding part of this work,” she says. “To help the world see people who they may have written off as powerless or unimportant or inconsequential.”

“An obsession” is how Gibson describes her interest in social justice. “I get obsessed in a way that I can’t let it go; it’s literally eating at me if I don’t do something about it. I get obsessed, then enraged. And I invest my own money, usually, and time.”

STORMY’s honest portrayal of Daniels as a multi-faceted human being is the culmination of Gibson’s experience in the industry. “This woman had been painted as a sort of one-dimensional person in the media,” Gibson says, describing Daniels. “She’s an animal advocate. She’s an athlete. She’s written a lot of books, she’s doing a stand-up comedy tour. She’s a Renaissance woman.”

Catch Stormy Daniels herself at the Rio Theatre on Sept. 10 for a screening of Stormy

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Sarah Gibson’s documentaries that shaped her

Enron: The Smartest Guys In The Room

“I remember my mind being blown when I saw Alex Gibney’s film and just loved the storytelling (those phone calls!) and the recreation at the beginning. It so inspired me and since then I was so lucky to collaborate with Alex, Jed Rothstein, Frank Marshall and Mark Cuban on The China Hustle (2017), which premiered at TIFF. Getting to work with so many of my documentary heroes while inspiring new, bi-partisan laws was a gift!”

Who Killed The Electric Car?

“Alex was involved in this film too, directed by Chris Paine and produced by Jessie Deeter. I remember going to the premiere at Sony in 2006 and hearing Jessie speak. I was so impressed with her and this film, I drove a car that ran on vegetable oil for a while after seeing it. I’ve made two environmental crisis films since then, one of them, Tapped, with Stephanie Soechtig and Jessie, who has become a good friend. She and Alex are now making a film on Elon Musk together, which I am so excited to see.”

Man on Wire

“The power of a breathtaking archive, found footage, unearthed stories from the past. This film is unforgettable. I was honoured to work with Simon Chinn, who produced this film when I produced the Emmy-winning LA92 with him in 2017. Since then I have repeatedly leaned into rare archives to inspire storytelling.”

Deliver Us From Evil

“Growing up Catholic this film hit hard. I feel it kicked off a library of documentaries on the topic of child sexual abuse and put a spotlight on a topic that before this nobody wanted to see. Directed by the courageous and beautiful human Amy Berg, I was able to find the courage in myself to produce the Emmy nominated What Haunts Us (2017) and the Emmy Honors winning At The Heart of Gold (2018) about USA gymnastics and Larry Nassar. Since then I was able to collaborate with Amy on Keep This Between Us about sexual abuse by teachers in American highschools, which resulted in the conviction and long jail term for a pedophile. Working with her was such an honour and we are hoping to work on something again together soon.”

John Lewis: Good Trouble

“Dawn Porter’s incredible film on John Lewis expanded my heart and mind in ways that words fail me. I just love this man and this filmmaker. After he died, C-Span became 50% more boring. This is how political biopics should be done. I am working with Dawn on a social justice project now, which is another dream come true.”

Mommy Dead & Dearest

“Erin Lee Carr’s incredible twisty film on Gypsy Rose [Blanchard] was another mind altering experience to watch. The power of leaning into the bizarre, uncomfortable silences and finding the radical empathy in myself is what I recall feeling as I watched. The archive was mind blowing. I have gone on to produce four films with Erin and two films with Sara Bernstein, one of them STORMY. The collaboration with these two powerful artists on stories about women and the justice system has been one of the most fulfilling experiences of my life. We are developing another woman-focused film together now and hope we continue to tell stories together in years to come.”

My Country! My Country!

“This was the first film I saw made by the brilliant Laura Poitras. I remember seeing this at the Baltimore Film Festival in 2006 and meeting her afterwards. Laura operated the camera with bombs going off around her. Her bravery to tackle tough topics and throwing herself into discomfort has endlessly inspired me. And although I have never made a film in a war zone, at least not yet, I always think of her and try and muster her courage when I am feeling scared, which when making docs on tough subjects is an often familiar feeling. Like being in the sentencing of Larry Nassar. If I am scared, I know I am onto something, and I am growing as a storyteller and a human, so I keep going.”