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Filmmakers to Visit Delta State

By April 20, 2009General

A documentary film crew from the Mississippi Film Office will visit the Delta State University campus Monday, April 20 and Tuesday, April 21.

 
The crew will gather footage and commentary for a follow-up to the 2009 documentary film Prom Night in Mississippi.  They will interview current Delta State freshman, Chasidy Buckley, and John Ellis Ray.  Buckley and Ray are from Charleston and attended Charleston High School’s first integrated prom in 2008.
 
In 2008, Academy-award-winning actor, Morgan Freeman, offered to pay for the Charleston High School senior prom, provided both black and white students be allowed to attend.  The town of Charleston had a tradition of holding two proms – one for white students, one for black students.  The school accepted and history was made.
 
Prom Night in Mississippi tells the story of the results of Freeman’s offer, as students at Charleston High rally in preparation for the school’s first-ever integrated prom.
 
The movie premiered January 17 at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival and was overwhelmingly well received. Its Mississippi premiere was at the Oxford Film Festival and Crossroads Film Festival, where it received the Audience Award. Currently, Prom Night in Mississippi is on the US film festival circuit, amazing and inspiring audiences with the story that captured the essence of what it means to have ‘one town, two proms.’
 
Prom Night in Mississippi is scheduled to premiere on HBO in July 2009.