{"id":402263,"date":"2026-09-17T06:22:55","date_gmt":"2026-09-17T06:22:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/402263\/"},"modified":"2026-09-17T06:22:55","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T06:22:55","slug":"a-documentary-on-new-college-showing-in-the-tampa-bay-area","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/402263\/","title":{"rendered":"A documentary on New College showing in the Tampa Bay area"},"content":{"rendered":"

The conservative takeover at New College of Florida in Sarasota drew national headlines, until the cameras turned to other matters.<\/p>\n

As eyes turned elsewhere, a group of filmmakers stayed on campus and produced the documentary, \u201cFirst They Came for My College.\u201d<\/p>\n

Producer Harry Hanbury and director Patrick Bresnan say the film tells the story from the perspective of the students as the changes took place. It\u2019s told mostly through the eyes of Chloe Rusek and Gaby Batista, staffers of the campus student newspaper.<\/p>\n

Since its premiere on March 5 at the True\/False Film Festival in Missouri, the documentary has been screened around the country and in Florida.<\/p>\n

Now, it\u2019s finally getting around to the Tampa Bay area and also returning to Sarasota.<\/p>\n

The film played last weekend during the TIGLIFF Queer Film and Arts Festival at Green Light Cinema in St. Petersburg, and it returns to Green Light for a weeklong run beginning Friday.<\/p>\n

From Oct. 23-29, the film returns to Sarasota\u2019s Burns Court Cinema, where it was shown in May. The theater is about 6 miles from campus.<\/p>\n

ALSO READ: This documentary delves into conservative influence at New College of Florida<\/a><\/p>\n

In between, a Florida run takes the film to Gainesville\u2019s Hippodome Theatre and Miami\u2019s O Cinema from Thursday through Sept. 26.<\/p>\n

From Oct. 9-15, the documentary is scheduled for Orlando\u2019s Enzian theater, where it made its Florida premier in April. On Oct. 10-11, it will be part of the Tallahassee Film Festival.<\/p>\n

In an interview with WLRN, Bresnan said the campus changes marked a turning point for higher education in the U.S, pointing to similar conservative pushes taking place in Texas and North Carolina.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat began at New College has been rippling all around the country,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Bresnan added that while showing the film in more liberal parts of the country, like California, crowds have in some cases written off the story as something that can only happen in Florida.<\/p>\n

\u201cI’m just so quick to tell them, like, \u2018Arnold Schwarzenegger used to be your governor. This is coming for California,’ \u201d Bresnan said. \u201cPeople think this is just a Florida thing \u2014 this is a big, big story that is coming for universities, even in liberal places.\u201d<\/p>\n

Information from WLRN\u2019s Daniel Rivero was used in this report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The conservative takeover at New College of Florida in Sarasota drew national headlines, until the cameras turned to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":402264,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[135,137,136],"class_list":["post-402263","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402263","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=402263"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/402263\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/402264"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=402263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=402263"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=402263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}