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Director / Creator Desmond Faison has lived in the margins of the great American experience for the majority of his life. A black man born and raised in the inner city of Portland, Oregon in the mid-nineties, he has lived a variety of experiences not many people can honestly say they knew existed. As an undersized elementary age kid with a debilitating speech impediment, he was shipped 30 minutes by bus daily to an all white elementary school. As he overcame his disability, he attended high school in his gang and drug riddled, North-East Portland, neighborhood where he was a star football player. Faison's college experience was much the same starting at an HBCU in rural Langston, Oklahoma, before moving to the rural, agriculture based, and economically depressed California Central Valley Junior College. His collegiate football career eventually took him to Montana State University, where he received his B.S, in Human & Family Science. It wasn't until post college Faison discovered his true passion and life's calling in the arts. Proving to be a natural brilliant creativity, his talents eventually settled him in Los Angeles, California where he has lived and worked in TV & Film for the past nearly 20 years.
Throughout his life Desmond spent time in the trenches....in places where nearly everyone around him were from where he is from. He has witnessed first hand families torn apart by the opioid crisis in the all but forgotten places right here in America. Places so foreign to the everyday American experience that it almost feels like foreign lands all together. He has seen how fear, stoked in places lacking any diversity at all, can proliferate and fester left unaddressed. From being the tinny, fragile kid in the "special needs'' classes, to the shy teen suddenly thrusted into popularity, an athlete graduating college on a full-ride scholarship, and as an adult, to an elected LA County office holder, Desmond has spent the majority of his life simultaneously on the margins and at the same time helping to bridge the gaps between starkly different world views.
So it's only natural when standing behind the lens of a camera, his focus and dedication for telling honest, important, culture shifting, and perspective challenging stories is as important to him, as his background is unique. A quiet, thoughtful person by nature, telling stories from the perspective of the underdog, marginalized, and overlooked is what sets Desmond's soul on fire. His no non-sense approach to Directing and Photography is clearly evident in his preference for dark / moody colors, use of slightly off balanced frames, and affinity for almost seeming to cast shadows as characters in his slow burning, often quiet, but always relevant, and honest stories.
Desmond Faison's unique exposure to the breath of the American experience which has made him into the man and the creative he is today, is truly one of one.
