Yance Ford director/producer based in New York City. His debut film Strong Island won a Sundance Film Festival Special Jury Prize and the Gotham Award for Best Documentary and the Black Film Critics Circle Award for Best Doc. Strong Island was nominated for Best Documentary Feature at the 90th Academy Awards, where Ford made history as the first openly transgender director nominated for the Oscar. Strong Island won the Primetime Emmy for Exceptional Merit in Documentary Filmmaking. Ford is a MacDowell fellow, a member of the Sundance Institute Collective, and was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2019. His profile of former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich can be seen in the Netflix series Trial by Media. Ford directed the 90's: Culture Wars episode of the FX series Pride premiering May 14, 2021.