Screening a lynching : the Leo Frank case on film and television / Matthew H. Bernstein.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Bernstein, Matthew.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Frank, Leo, 1884-1915--In motion pictures.

Frank, Leo.

Frank, Leo, 1884-1915--On television.

Frank, Leo, 1884-1915.

Physical Description:

xv, 332 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Athens : University of Georgia Press, [2009]

Summary:

The Leo Frank case of 1913 was one of the most sensational trials of the early twentieth century, capturing international attention. Frank, a northern Jewish factory supervisor in Atlanta, was convicted for the murder of Mary Phagan, a young laborer native to the South, largely on the perjured testimony of an African American janitor. The trial was both a murder mystery and a courtroom drama marked by lurid sexual speculation and overt racism. The subsequent lynching of Frank in 1915 by an angry mob only made the story more irresistible to historians, playwrights, novelists, musicians, and filmmakers for decades to come.

Matthew H. Bernstein is the first scholar to examine the feature films and television programs produced in response to the trial and lynching of Leo Frank. He considers the four major surviving American texts: Oscar Micheaux's film Murder in Harlem (1936), Mervyn LeRoy's film They Won't Forget (1937), the Profiles in Courage television episode "John M. Slaton" (1964), and the two-part NBC miniseries The Murder of Mary Phagan (1988). Exploring the cultural and industrial contexts in which the works were produced, Bernstein considers how they succeeded or failed in representing the case's many facets.

Contents:

Introduction 1

1 Cinematic Justice across the Color Line: / Oscar Micheaux, Leo Frank 25

2 The Phagan-Frank Case as 1930s Hollywood Message Movie: They Won't Forget 60

Interlude: From Film to Television 118

3 John M. Slaton as a Profile in Courage 122

4 The "Full" Treatment: The Murder of Mary Phagan 171.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 269-315) and index.

Includes filmography: pages 265-267.

ISBN:

9780820327525

0820327522

9780820332390

0820332399

OCLC:

225874021