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Documentary Film SECOND NATURE Screening October 10, With a Conversation + Q & A Raising Urgent Concerns Over Government Censorship of Science
Themed Around Banned Books Week and the Harms of Censorship, the Benefit Event will be Headlined by Actor Elliot Page, authors Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson, film director Drew Denny and evolutionary biologist Dr. Joan Roughgarden.
Elliot Page and Drew Denny, the narrator and director of the documentary SECOND NATURE, will join trailblazing evolutionary biologist Dr. Joan Roughgarden, authors Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson (And Tango Makes Three) and the national literary and free speech non-profit PEN America for an Oct. 10 online screening and conversation about government censorship related to the sciences. Proceeds will support a national tour of the film as a suicide prevention resource for LGBTQ+ youth.
The critically-acclaimed film focuses on groundbreaking scientists whose research reveals truths about the animal kingdom, including same-sex behaviors and parenting. . The 3pm (ET) screening will be immediately followed by an interactive Q and A and conversation with Page, Denny, Roughgarden, Parnell and Richardson, moderated by Jonathan Friedman, PEN America’s Sy Sims managing director for U.S. Free Expression programs.
Friedman said: “This documentary couldn’t be more timely and relevant. We are living in a country where scientists are subject to destructive ideological censorship and have to watch what they write or say for fear the government will retaliate against them – particularly as it relates to the LGBTQ+ community. This alarming reality extends to the federal government adapting a list of forbidden words to screen research projects. This obviously puts whole areas of research at risk, across public health, safety, biology, human development, and more.”
As the U.S. government censors scientific terms and public schools increasingly censor nonfiction books including scientific titles, the screening comes at the culmination of Banned Books Week 2026. This year the Oct. 4-10 week is spotlighting the freedom to read and the harms of censorship. Censorship in both school libraries and public libraries has reached epidemic proportions with bans on picture books (including And Tango Makes Three, a fact-based story about two male penguins raising a chick together) as well as non-fiction books, including in the sciences, that explore themes with race and racism, gender identity, and sexuality. Book bans impact authors, educators, librarians, school boards – and, of course, readers.
SECOND NATURE is appropriate for all audiences ages 11 and up. Provided through the streaming platform Eventive, the screening will be available to the public with single tickets at $20 each for the screening and $25 to include the post-screening conversation (group tickets, for 2 attendees or more, are priced at $40 and $50 respectively). All proceeds will benefit Allies in Arts, which is leading the SECOND NATURE impact campaign, a national tour of the film as a suicide prevention resource for LGBTQ+ teens. Allies in Arts is a non-profit organization supporting women, BIPOC, and queer artists in all mediums through education, grants, exhibitions and mutual aid.
About SECOND NATURE
Narrated by Elliot Page, SECOND NATURE follows trailblazing evolutionary biologist Dr. Joan Roughgarden as she meets groundbreaking scientists exploring the 1500+ animal species who engage in same-sex sexual behavior and parenting, change sex, form matriarchies, and more, debunking myths that females are “inferior” and that being queer is “unnatural.”
Exploring topics few students learn in high school biology classrooms, the film answers questions such as: Did you know that clownfish change sex from male to female? (So if Nemo’s mom had died in real life, his dad could have become a female!) Did you know that albatross, penguins and swans parent in same sex pairs? Or that bonobos, who are just as closely related to us as chimps, are matriarchal and have same-sex sex every day?!
About the Partners
About Drew Denny, SECOND NATURE
Sundance Lab Fellow and Grantee Drew Denny is passionate about representing women and LGBTQ+ characters. Her one-woman-show turned Academy Award nominated podcast, Asking For It, explores her experience of intimate partner violence in queer relationships, and her feature documentary Survivor Made, executive produced by Roxane Gay, won a Silver Anthem award. She spent 11 years making Second Nature because it's the film she needed in high school in Texas where she was taught that females are "naturally inferior" to males and queerness is simply "unnatural." Like many survivors, she employs humor as a pleasurable protest against her harm doers and the systems that support them. She earned a BFA in Cinema and Television Production from USC and an MA in Aesthetics and Politics from California Institute of the Arts.
About Elliot Page, Pageboy Productions
Academy Award ® -nominated actor, director, producer, writer and New York Times bestselling author Elliot Page is known for his indelible on-screen presence in both tentpole and art house films. His love for storytelling and passion for social justice have taken him behind the camera as a producer and documentary filmmaker whose work answers the call to action of a generation. A tireless champion of the under-represented, Page uses his global platform to shed light on important social and LGBTQ+ issues. Page’s work and advocacy are motivated and informed by the urgency of global issues which impact the most marginalized among us.
With his production company, Page Boy Productions, Page develops and produces
entertaining, original and socially responsible stories. The company seeks creators and content from underrepresented communities and uplifts collaborators who have been denied equitable access to mainstream Hollywood. Page and Page Boy Productions have a first-look television deal with UCP, a division of Universal Studios Group, to develop both scripted and unscripted television projects.
About Dr. Joan Roughgarden
Joan Roughgarden is an American theoretical ecologist and evolutionary biologist. She has engaged in theory and observation of coevolution and competition in Anolis lizards of the Caribbean, and recruitment limitation in the rocky intertidal zones of California and Oregon. She has more recently become known for her rejection of sexual selection and her work on holobiont evolution.
About PEN America
PEN America stands at the intersection of literature and human rights to protect free expression in the United States and worldwide. We champion the freedom to write, recognizing the power of the word to transform the world. Our mission is to unite writers and their allies to celebrate creative expression and defend the liberties that make it possible. Learn more at pen.org.
About Allies in Arts
Founded in 2015, Allies in Arts supports women, BIPOC and LGBTQ+ creatives and youth. Their annual workshop, Transchool, has supported 60 young trans writers and 20 trans authors to mentor them and is currently publishing their third anthology. Their holiday mutual aid initiative Transanta has answered over 11,500 letters from trans youth in need and facilitated over $2.5 million worth of affirming holiday gifts. Through their Make It Anyway community on Substack, they offer weekly Writing Time, monthly Office Hours and Studio Visits, and Quarterly Craft Workshops.
Documentary Film SECOND NATURE Screening October 10, With a Conversation + Q & A Raising Urgent Concerns Over Government Censorship of Science
Themed Around Banned Books Week and the Harms of Censorship, the Benefit Event will be Headlined by Actor Elliot Page, authors Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson, film director Drew Denny and evolutionary biologist Dr. Joan Roughgarden.
Elliot Page and Drew Denny, the narrator and director of the documentary SECOND NATURE, will join trailblazing evolutionary biologist Dr. Joan Roughgarden, authors Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson (And Tango Makes Three) and the national literary and free speech non-profit PEN America for an Oct. 10 online screening and conversation about government censorship related to the sciences. Proceeds will support a national tour of the film as a suicide prevention resource for LGBTQ+ youth.
The critically-acclaimed film focuses on groundbreaking scientists whose research reveals truths about the animal kingdom, including same-sex behaviors and parenting. . The 3pm (ET) screening will be immediately followed by an interactive Q and A and conversation with Page, Denny, Roughgarden, Parnell and Richardson, moderated by Jonathan Friedman, PEN America’s Sy Sims managing director for U.S. Free Expression programs.
Friedman said: “This documentary couldn’t be more timely and relevant. We are living in a country where scientists are subject to destructive ideological censorship and have to watch what they write or say for fear the government will retaliate against them – particularly as it relates to the LGBTQ+ community. This alarming reality extends to the federal government adapting a list of forbidden words to screen research projects. This obviously puts whole areas of research at risk, across public health, safety, biology, human development, and more.”
As the U.S. government censors scientific terms and public schools increasingly censor nonfiction books including scientific titles, the screening comes at the culmination of Banned Books Week 2026. This year the Oct. 4-10 week is spotlighting the freedom to read and the harms of censorship. Censorship in both school libraries and public libraries has reached epidemic proportions with bans on picture books (including And Tango Makes Three, a fact-based story about two male penguins raising a chick together) as well as non-fiction books, including in the sciences, that explore themes with race and racism, gender identity, and sexuality. Book bans impact authors, educators, librarians, school boards – and, of course, readers.
SECOND NATURE is appropriate for all audiences ages 11 and up. Provided through the streaming platform Eventive, the screening will be available to the public with single tickets at $20 each for the screening and $25 to include the post-screening conversation (group tickets, for 2 attendees or more, are priced at $40 and $50 respectively). All proceeds will benefit Allies in Arts, which is leading the SECOND NATURE impact campaign, a national tour of the film as a suicide prevention resource for LGBTQ+ teens. Allies in Arts is a non-profit organization supporting women, BIPOC, and queer artists in all mediums through education, grants, exhibitions and mutual aid.
About SECOND NATURE
Narrated by Elliot Page, SECOND NATURE follows trailblazing evolutionary biologist Dr. Joan Roughgarden as she meets groundbreaking scientists exploring the 1500+ animal species who engage in same-sex sexual behavior and parenting, change sex, form matriarchies, and more, debunking myths that females are “inferior” and that being queer is “unnatural.”
Exploring topics few students learn in high school biology classrooms, the film answers questions such as: Did you know that clownfish change sex from male to female? (So if Nemo’s mom had died in real life, his dad could have become a female!) Did you know that albatross, penguins and swans parent in same sex pairs? Or that bonobos, who are just as closely related to us as chimps, are matriarchal and have same-sex sex every day?!
About the Partners
About Drew Denny, SECOND NATURE
Sundance Lab Fellow and Grantee Drew Denny is passionate about representing women and LGBTQ+ characters. Her one-woman-show turned Academy Award nominated podcast, Asking For It, explores her experience of intimate partner violence in queer relationships, and her feature documentary Survivor Made, executive produced by Roxane Gay, won a Silver Anthem award. She spent 11 years making Second Nature because it's the film she needed in high school in Texas where she was taught that females are "naturally inferior" to males and queerness is simply "unnatural." Like many survivors, she employs humor as a pleasurable protest against her harm doers and the systems that support them. She earned a BFA in Cinema and Television Production from USC and an MA in Aesthetics and Politics from California Institute of the Arts.
About Elliot Page, Pageboy Productions
Academy Award ® -nominated actor, director, producer, writer and New York Times bestselling author Elliot Page is known for his indelible on-screen presence in both tentpole and art house films. His love for storytelling and passion for social justice have taken him behind the camera as a producer and documentary filmmaker whose work answers the call to action of a generation. A tireless champion of the under-represented, Page uses his global platform to shed light on important social and LGBTQ+ issues. Page’s work and advocacy are motivated and informed by the urgency of global issues which impact the most marginalized among us.
With his production company, Page Boy Productions, Page develops and produces
entertaining, original and socially responsible stories. The company seeks creators and content from underrepresented communities and uplifts collaborators who have been denied equitable access to mainstream Hollywood. Page and Page Boy Productions have a first-look television deal with UCP, a division of Universal Studios Group, to develop both scripted and unscripted television projects.
About Dr. Joan Roughgarden
Joan Roughgarden is an American theoretical ecologist and evolutionary biologist. She has engaged in theory and observation of coevolution and competition in Anolis lizards of the Caribbean, and recruitment limitation in the rocky intertidal zones of California and Oregon. She has more recently become known for her rejection of sexual selection and her work on holobiont evolution.
About PEN America
PEN America stands at the intersection of literature and human rights to protect free expression in the United States and worldwide. We champion the freedom to write, recognizing the power of the word to transform the world. Our mission is to unite writers and their allies to celebrate creative expression and defend the liberties that make it possible. Learn more at pen.org.
About Allies in Arts
Founded in 2015, Allies in Arts supports women, BIPOC and LGBTQ+ creatives and youth. Their annual workshop, Transchool, has supported 60 young trans writers and 20 trans authors to mentor them and is currently publishing their third anthology. Their holiday mutual aid initiative Transanta has answered over 11,500 letters from trans youth in need and facilitated over $2.5 million worth of affirming holiday gifts. Through their Make It Anyway community on Substack, they offer weekly Writing Time, monthly Office Hours and Studio Visits, and Quarterly Craft Workshops.