Bloomsday Film Festival: Ulysses, New York – An Introduction with Director Caveh Zahedi

Ulysses, New York is an ambitious 24-part adaptation of James Joyce’s Ulysses by Caveh Zahedi, an American autobiographical filmmaker known for his self-reflexive and formally adventurous approach to cinema. His feature films include Autobiographical Filmmaker Seeks Camera-Friendly Companion (2025), The Sheik and I (2012), I Am a Sex Addict (2005), In the Bathtub of the World (2001), I Don’t Hate Las Vegas Anymore (1994), and A Little Stiff (1991). He is also the creator of the web series The Show About the Show and the writer/host of the podcast 365 Stories I Want To Tell You Before We Both Die.

With Ulysses, New York, Zahedi attempts to do to Joyce’s Ulysses what Joyce did to Homer’s The Odyssey: transpose a canonical work into a new time, place and form. The events of 16 June 1904 in Dublin are reimagined as taking place on 16 June 2022 in New York City, on the centenary of the novel’s publication. Following eight actors performing in a Bloomsday stage production of Ulysses, the film moves between Joyce’s chapters onstage and the corresponding hours of the actors’ real day. This special presentation features a work-in-progress version of the introductory episode, followed by a discussion with Zahedi on the challenges of adapting Joyce.