Julia Scotti never anticipated her career as a comedian would take her where it did. She worked regularly at a club in Philadelphia performing her sets and after making local headlines as a talented trans comedian, America’s Got Talent called. What followed was a tide of attention and opportunities ranging from albums to interviews. 

“I’m just sort of floating along, a boat in the sea, and fish are jumping into my boat,” Scotti says. “And then Susan came along.” 

Director Susan Sandler met Scotti in 2016 at a performance in Nantucket at the Dreamland Theatre. They connected personally and professionally, planning a project to tell Scotti’s story. It evolved from a TV pilot to a one-woman show, until Sandler stepped back and realized Scotti’s story was better represented as a documentary. For five years, Sandler followed Scotti and dug through archival documents, journals, photos and videos to write, direct and produce Julia Scotti: Funny That Way. 

Compiling Scotti, her life and career, into a documentary required incredible reflection to understand what parts of her life would become the throughline of the documentary. 

“It's all about figuring out the world, the character, and the journey,” Sandler says. “The difference is in a documentary, you get what you get. It's what life gives you.” 

Throughout the process, Sandler combed through boxes of material Scotti shared with her and discovered a manuscript Scotti had written that perfectly introduced her life. Sandler asked her to read it and realized that it would be the opening sequence of the film. 

“It was intuitive that that was a story that would give us an introduction to her as a character,” Sandler explains. “That sequence from her book or manuscript that I thought was really valuable to my process—and probably to hers as well.” 

For Sandler, the process of creating the film involved both looking at the past and the present to find the life in Scotti’s comedy and writing. To help bring those pieces to life, she employed the help of animator Sam Roth. They went back and forth, going through footage and drafts of Julia’s animated character to create a representation of Julia that helped move the documentary forward in certain sequences. 

In one, Scotti’s animated character strolls through her history as a comedian while the background constantly changes from club to club behind her. The use of animation creatively culminated her world and allowed the story to breathe and blend her life as a comedian with her personal life. 

“Her comedy is about her lived experience,” Sandler states. “It's a reflection on [her private life] in a sense, so it became almost like a chapter heading. And as the structure evolved, the comedy helped to sort of organize the private and that's how it all really developed.”

Part of Scotti's lived experience that has a strong presence in the documentary is her relationship with her children. After a tangled separation from her ex-wife and children after coming out as transgender, Scotti reconnects with her son and daughter, who are now adults. 

“It was a real gift to be able to watch the beginning of this family reuniting,” Sandler says. “The conversations that we had were very much therapeutic in the way of talking about the history and then talking about the beginning of that.”

From a PFLAG meeting to a candid conversation on the couch, Scotti and her son Dan open up to each other through comedy. 

“It was very exciting to watch Julia sharing her process and her comedy history with her son, who had been working in the same field in the years they were apart,” Sandler says. 

The documentary covers a lot of ground, but is knit together by the themes of family, fearlessness and courage that Scotti exudes in her performance and life. 

“I think this is a film that makes people feel good,” Sandler says. “It makes people feel good about being truthful and being themselves in the world, and being creative, and being fearless and all the things that Julia does in her comedy.” 

Scotti explains that she makes her presence known as a trans comedian to connect with the community, showing exactly what Sandler described.

After her appearance on America’s Got Talent, Scotti received emails and messages from people across the world who were inspired by her. They looked up to her. Her dedication and love for the trans community, especially trans kids, are woven into almost every sequence of the documentary. So much so that the film comes from a place of love and growth. In collaboration with Sandler’s directing and writing skills, we see how dedicated Scotti is to her craft and community. 

“Part of the reason I even came out on AGT as trans—because that was my choice—was to help people and that's what I hope this movie will do too,” Scotti says. “That it will offer, if nothing else, a vision of what life could be like if you follow this path. It's not always easy, and it's not always painless, but if you stick to it and you believe in yourself, then there can be a happy outcome.” 

Julia Scotti: Funny That Way is currently available on all major VOD platforms.