Exclusive: Brad Lichtenstein and Yoruba Richen talk PBS documentary American Coup: Wilmington 1898
Premiering this week on American Experience on PBS is the documentary American Coup: Wilmington 1898, directed by award-winning filmmakers Brad Lichtenstein and Yoruba Richen in association with PBS North Carolina and executive produced by Cameo George and Rachel Raney. American Coup: Wilmington 1898 will stream for free for three years following its broadcast on PBS.org and the PBS app.
American Coup: Wilmington 1898 tells the little-known story of a deadly race massacre and carefully orchestrated insurrection in North Carolina’s largest city in 1898 — the only coup d’état in the history of the US. Stoking fears of “Negro Rule,” self-described white supremacists used intimidation and violence to destroy Black political and economic power and overthrow Wilmington’s democratically-elected, multi-racial government. Black residents were murdered and thousands were banished.
The story of what happened in Wilmington was suppressed for decades until descendants and scholars began to investigate. Today, many of those descendants — Black and white — seek the truth about this intentionally buried history. Directed by award-winning filmmakers Brad Lichtenstein and Yoruba Richen in association with PBS North Carolina and executive produced by Cameo George and Rachel Raney,
Brad Lichtenstein (Director, Writer, Producer) is an award-winning filmmaker and founder of 371 Productions. He won a 2022 Primetime Emmy for When Claude Got Shot. He was nominated for a Sports Emmy for the VR film Ashe ’68, which premiered at Sundance in 2019, and a News and Documentary Emmy for the 2012 INDEPENDENT LENS/PBS film As Goes Janesville. He’s won two Dupont Awards: one for the 2016 Al Jazeera America series Hard Earned (with Kartemquin Films) and another for his 2001 film Ghosts of Attica (with Lumiere Productions).
His 2022 film, American Reckoning (with producer/director Yoruba Richen) for the PBS series FRONTLINE, was nominated for a Peabody and a News & Documentary Emmy for Best Historical Documentary. With Emily Kuester, he directed Messwood for Participant, which premiered in 2021 at DocNYC. His radio series about gun violence, Precious Lives, was nominated for a Peabody. Since 2003, his company has been committed to nurturing the careers of emerging women and BIPOC storytellers.
Yoruba Richen (Director, Writer, Producer) is a Peabody Award-winning documentary filmmaker and founder of Promised Land Film. She was recently awarded the Trailblazer Award by Black Public Media, and her work has been featured on multiple outlets, including Netflix, MSNBC, Peacock and FX/Hulu. Her film, The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks, won a Gracie Award and was honored by the Television Academy. Other recent work includes the Emmy-nominated films American Reckoning, How It Feels to Be Free, The Sit In: Harry Belafonte Hosts the Tonight Show, and Green Book: Guide to Freedom.
Her film, The Killing of Breonna Taylor, won an NAACP Image Award. Her films The New Black and Promised Land won multiple festival awards before airing on PBS's INDEPENDENT LENS and POV. Richen’s other work includes directing an episode of the award-winning series Black and Missing for HBO and High on the Hog for Netflix. Richen is a recipient of the Chicken & Egg Breakthrough Filmmaker’s Award and a Guggenheim Fellowship. She is the Founding Director of the Documentary Program at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY.
Blackfilmandtv.com's Wilson Morales talks to Brad Lichtenstein and Yoruba Richen talk PBS documentary American Coup: Wilmington 1898