Photo of Lowndes County COURTESY OF GREENWICH ENTERTAINMENT
The NBCUniversal streaming platform Peacock is now airing the much-anticipated documentary: ‘Lowndes County and the Road to Black Power’, on February 2nd to kick off a month of celebrating Black history. The film employs a great volume of archived video footage and first-hand accounts to represent the local struggle of a group of young Black activists for voting and other rights in the context of the Civil Rights Movement.
The story of ‘Lowndes County and the Road to Black Power’ was first researched and recounted by The Atlantic journalist Vann R. Newkirk II, who will also be serving as a consulting producer for the film. Based on Newkirk’s published work, the thrilling documentary film is presented by Multitude Films’ Participant, in association with The Atlantic. It is directed by renowned filmmakers Sam Pollard and Geeta Gandbhir, and is 90 minutes in length.
The film’s trailer was first aired as a Peacock original at Tribeca Festival on June 14th, 2022. It was then announced that the film will be coming to Peacock for streaming as part of new documentaries airing on the platform for Black History Month 2023, along with notably Bel-Air Season 2 (February 23). “We jumped at the chance to work with award-winning documentarians Sam Pollard and Geeta Gandbhir,” said Rachel Smith, EVP Development chair at NBCUniversal on the occasion: “Lowndes County presented us with the unique opportunity to shed light on a lesser-known piece of the civil rights movement and is exactly the type of meaningful storytelling we strive to amplify at Peacock.”
The CEO of Participant David Linde emphasized: “Geeta and Sam’s film vividly highlights the important contemporary truth that long after the Voting Rights Act was passed – and indeed still today – communities had to continue to fight to see those rights recognized.”
The documentary in question draws from revived archival footage, Newkirk’s textual research, as well as first-hand interviews and other local accounts of the events that occurred in Lowndes County, Alabama, after the passing of the Civil Rights Act in 1965. ‘Lowndes County and the Road to Black Power’ tells the story of a local activist movement led by young students in what was then a poor country area with 80% Black residents but zero Black voters. It shows not only how the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) organizers fought to pave the way for the implementation of the Civil Rights Act and other anti-racist legislation, and strengthen the Black Power in south-central Alabama.