Among essential works by Clarke, this documentary feature has been named to the National Film Registry for preservation; she and Carl Lee (of Clarke’s The Connection) sat in a Hotel Chelsea apartment with sex worker Jason Holliday (birth name, Aaron Payne) from night ’til morning. A world premiere at the 5th New York Film Festival, the movie opened immediately after to acclaim; Elia Kazan called it “a piece of new ground.” In 2009, Melissa Anderson wrote that it “says more about race, class, and sexuality than just about any movie before or since.”