Live and Archived: Episode #122: Director/Producer of THE LOVING STORY Nancy Buirski

photo courtesy of Life Magazine

ITYC had a fantastic talk with Director and Producer of new documentary THE LOVING STORY, Nancy Buirski today.  During our discussion, she said that the story of race "is the American story" and for that reason she feels compelled to "recover" these stories which would have otherwise been lost to time.  The heart of THE LOVING STORY is Hope Ryden's film of the Lovings from 1965 and the powerful choices both Nancy and editor Elisabeth Haviland James made in constructing the film using Ryden's impeccable footage.  Nancy shared the story of how she came to find Ryden's goldmine of film which had been sitting at the bottom of Ryden's closet for 44 years.

Another remarkable piece of THE LOVING STORY is how it dives right into the racial climate of the time, illustrating just how unanimous sentiments of anti-miscegenation were across the South and America.  The virulent racism, supported by the state and by racist religious beliefs, echo the poisonous hatred that supports the federal ban on same-sex marriage.  Central Point, Virginia, the Lovings' hometown, was a microscopic "oasis" in this restrictive environment Nancy said, where people had been mixing freely for years.  The Lovings reluctantly found themselves at the center of the struggle to dismantle a central piece of the institutionalized white supremacy that forms the foundation of this country's legal and social systems.

As talk moved to Nancy's upcoming projects, I was excited to hear that she is producing a slew of incredible films including The Mystery of The Moulin Rouge, which tells the story of Las Vegas' first integrated casino, Althea, the story of Althea Gibson, and Harlem Woodstock which tells the story of a star-studded series of concerts that took place 3 weeks before Woodstock in Harlem.

If you are looking for upcoming screenings of THE LOVING STORY, please head over to the Facebook page for the film or the film's website.  As I mentioned on the podcast, the film will be screened at the Silverdocs Film Festival in Washington, D.C. in June and at a screening hosted by the American Civil Liberties Union on June 13th on Capitol Hill.  The film will premiere on HBO in February 2012.  We're also hoping for a theatrical release of the documentary!

Thanks again to Nancy Buirski and everyone involved in bringing the Lovings' story to life and thanks to Mildred and Richard Loving and everyone who came before them for who paved the way to overturn anti-miscegenation laws in the United States.

For those interested in doing some further reading about the Lovings and the struggle to overturn anti-miscegenation laws, check out these books:

Virginia Hasn't Always Been for Lovers: Interracial Marriage Bans and the Case of Richard and Mildred Loving 
by Phyl Newbeck

What Comes Naturally: Miscegenation Law and the Making of Race in America
by Peggy Pascoe

Tell the Court I Love My Wife: Race, Marriage, and Law--An American History 
by Peter Wallenstein