Madame Pipi
Rachelle Salnave
Documentary | United States, Haiti | 2021 | 25min
Madame Pipi follows the lives of Haitian Female bathroom attendants working in the nightclubs in Miami. Relatively invisible, underpaid and under-appreciated, their stories leave behind a journey of triumph as they massage the patron's temperaments for tips. Despite the rising cost of living and now the uncertainty of COVID-19 shutting down nightlife, their remittances given through tips coupled with the larger contribution from the Haitian Diaspora fuels more than one third of the GDP in Haiti.
Interview Subjects
Jacqueline Benjamin, Darline Francoeur, Micheline Devalon, Juliette Joseph, Yolande Saintilis
Rachelle Salnave is a talented filmmaker currently based in South Florida who for the past 20 years has focused her lens on the Black Global experience.
The first of a handful of filmmakers to document the gentrification of Harlem, Rachelle works include capturing stories about the Haitian Guantanamo Bay experience, Macadamia Nut planting experiments in Guatemala and spotlighting Haitian identity and its society. Rachelle was part of the first class of Sundance Institute Screenwriters Intensive Fellows in Miami in 2015. Her second feature documentary, La Belle Vie: The Good Life landed her an Emmy nomination in 2016. In 2017, Knight Foundation honored Rachelle as a “Knight Arts Champion” for her cinematic programming, Ayiti Images and Black Lounge Films. Rachelle’s goal is to change the narrative of Haiti and the Haitian Diaspora capturing the sights and sounds of this magical island.
Her current documentary films, Madame Pipi is in post-production and she is in production for her 3rd feature documentary entitled Dual Citizen.
