Rise Again: Tulsa and the Red Summer – Director Dawn Porter

In 1921, white mobs in Tulsa terrorized and burned down the Greenwood District, known as “Negro Wall Street.”  With the discovery of a mass grave, the city reckons with its painful past.  In the early 20th century, racial violence erupted in dozens of cities across the United States. Hundreds were killed. Black communities fought back, rebuilt, and prospered in the face of extreme oppression and the evils of white supremacy.  RISE AGAIN: TULSA AND THE RED SUMMER comes one hundred years from the two-day Tulsa Massacre in 1921 that led to the murder of hundreds of Black people and left thousands homeless and displaced. Award-winning Washington Post journalist and Oklahoma native DeNeen Brown is at the heart of the film, reporting on the search for a mass grave in her native state. Digging into the events that led to one of the worst episodes of racial violence in America’s history, Brown reveals insights into racial conflict incidents that erupted in the early 20th century. Between 1917 and 1923, when  Jim Crow laws were at their height and the Klu Klux Klan was resurging across the nation, scores of Black homes and businesses were razed, and hundreds of Black people were lynched and massacred with impunity. Brown’s reporting highlights the revived call for justice for victims and survivors. Following a 2018 investigative report, Brown explores the current anti-racism movement in the context of the Tulsa Massacre and the Red Summer. With access to family members of those killed, city officials, archeologists, and historians, the film reveals the decades-long effort by descendants and community members to find victims’ bodies and unearth truths that have been suppressed for nearly a century. RISE AGAIN: TULSA AND THE RED SUMMER also untangles the role the media played in covering events at the time in order to reveal the full extent of the nation’s buried past. Director Dawn Porter joins us for a sobering conversation about the shameful abandonment of Reconstruction, the shameless racism of President Wilson, the planned, military grade assault on the Tulsa’s Black community of Greenwood and the buried, figuratively and literally, history that continues to haunt our country.

 

Download MP3 Podcast | Open Player in New Window

For updates and screenings go to: nationalgeographic.com/riseagain

RISE AGAIN: TULSA AND THE RED SUMMER will premiere in June on National Geographic, commemorating Juneteenth when the last enslaved Black people in Texas received news of their emancipation, and will air globally in 172 countries and 43 languages.

About the filmmaker – Dawn Porter’s is an award-winning filmmaker, producer, and mental health/social justice advocate who has emerged in the entertainment industry as a leader in the art of storytelling. She made her feature directorial debut in 2013 with Gideon’s Army, which premiered on HBO, was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award and an Emmy, won Best Editing at Sundance, and is now part of the U.S. Department of State’s American Film Showcase. Her 2016 film Trapped, which explores laws regulating abortion clinics in the South, won the Special Jury Social-Impact Prize at the Sundance Film Festival, and a Peabody Award. She is set to direct and executive produce Oprah Winfrey and Prince Harry’s upcoming documentary series on mental illness and mental well-being for Apple TV+. For more go to: trilogy-films.com

SOCIAL MEDIA
facebook.com/natgeodocs
twitter.com/natgeodocs
twitter.com/dawnporter
twitter.com/DeNeenLBrown
instagram.com/natgeodocs
instagram.com/dawnporter
@dawnporter
@natgeodocs

“A sober reminder of the history many want to erase, all but ensuring it’ll repeat itself for the next hundred years as well.” – Roger Moore, Movie Nation

“Rise Again proves itself to be an extensive deep dive into a subject that needs to be taught. It’s time to remove [our collective] blindfold.” – Jared Mobarak, The Film Stage

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *