Ask E. Jean: "You will see yourself. You will see your sisters. You will see your mother. You will recognize so much of what we all experience... Men too."

In this vHopeful Conversation, filmmaker Vanessa Hope speaks with Emmy‑nominated documentarian Ivy Meeropol about her new film Ask E. Jean, a portrait of advice columnist and writer E. Jean Carroll that goes far beyond the courtroom headlines to explore her Miss Cheerleader USA past, gonzo magazine career, TV show, and late‑in‑life decision to publicly confront Donald Trump. They discuss the challenge of balancing E. Jean’s buoyant, hilarious persona with the gravity of the assault and its lifelong impact, the complicity and constraints of the boys’‑club media world she navigated, and the transformative power of women’s friendship and lawyering embodied by Carroll’s bond with attorney Robbie Kaplan and her close circle of friends. Throughout, Ivy reflects on how E. Jean’s willingness at 75 to reckon with her past, revise her own advice‑giver legacy, and insist on telling the truth offers exhausted audiences something rare in the Trump era: a story that is both deeply sobering and unexpectedly joyful, galvanizing viewers—women and men alike—to see sexual violence, patriarchy, and American democracy as inextricably linked. Get full access to Dream of a Better World at vanessahope.substack.com/subscribe