Ask E. Jean - Director Ivy Meeropol

Ask E. Jean is the riveting story of E. Jean Carroll’s life, from her early days as Miss Cheerleader USA to her rise as a trailblazing journalist, author, and beloved advice columnist. Carroll broke barriers as the first female editor at Esquire, Playboy, and Outside, helping to redefine women’s roles in media with her sharp wit and fearless voice. In recent years, she reignited public discourse by standing up to power, becoming the only woman to beat Donald Trump twice in court, and sparking a national conversation about truth, accountability, and resilience. This film is a portrait of an indomitable woman who proved it’s never too late to reclaim your voice, rewrite your story, and change the world. Directed and produced by award winning filmmaker Ivy Meeropol (Heir to An Execution, Roy Cohn: Bully, Coward, Victim) and produced by award winning filmmakers Laura Bickford (Traffic, Beast Of No Nation) and Annabelle Dunne (Joan Didion: The Center Will Not Hold, Everything Is Copy).

About the filmmaker - IVY MEEROPOL premiered Ask E. Jean, her feature documentary film about the advice columnist and journalist E. Jean Carroll who sued Donald Trump for rape and defamation and won, at the 2025 Telluride Film Festival. The film has gone on to show at festivals across the country, winning the Grand Jury Award for Best Documentary at The Hot Springs International Documentary Festival, and audience awards at Key West, Sun Valley, and Palm Springs. Ask E. Jean was the closing night film at DOCNYC, and Opening Night film at the Thessaloniki Documentary Film Festival. Her previous feature documentary AFTER THE BITE, about the explosion of great white sharks and seals on Cape Cod, premiered July 2023 on HBO. She premiered her HBO documentary ROY COHN: BULLY, COWARD, VICTIM at the 2019 New York Film Festival and in 2020 the film was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Historical Documentary. She was the Senior Story Producer on the CNNFilms documentary THE END: INSIDE THE LAST DAYS OF THE OBAMA WHITE HOUSE, which premiered at the National Archives in Washington, DC, and was one of the highest rated of CNN’s Original films. She directed and produced the feature INDIAN POINT, about an aging nuclear power plant close to New York City, which was honored with the Frontline Award for Journalism in a Documentary Film and aired on NHK during the anniversary of Fukushima in Japan. Ivy created and directed the nonfiction series THE HILL (Sundance Channel), about Congressman Robert Wexler (D-FL) and his young staff (nominated for best series by the International Documentary Association). She produced the feature documentary MUSEUM TOWN, which premiered at SXSW, and has produced and directed for the Emmy Award winning climate change series YEARS OF LIVING DANGEROUSLY (National Geographic) and for DEATH ROW STORIES (CNN), Executive Produced by Alex Gibney and Robert Redford. Ivy’s debut film, HEIR TO AN EXECUTION (HBO), explored the legacy of her grandparents Ethel and Julius Rosenberg. It premiered at Sundance and was shortlisted for an Academy Award. Ivy was a Sundance Institute Fellow and has been awarded grants from the Sundance Documentary Fund, the NY State Council for the Arts, and the MacArthur Foundation. She is a member of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts & Sciences