
On August 22, 1964, Hurricane Cleo began its five-day destructive tour throughout the Caribbean Sea, politician Benajmin J. Davis passed away at the age of 60 and Nelson Mandela served the 92nd day of his 27-year prison sentence. Yet, none of these historical events led evening news programs on ABC, NBC, or CBS. Instead, the nation turned its head toward the type of person that it so often neglects, a Black woman from the south.
Standing no taller than 66 inches, wearing an intricately designed dress and carrying a purse reminiscent of church plates and Bible verses, activist Fannie Lou Hamer made her way to the stage at the 1964 Democratic National Convention. Amidst pressure from Democratic leaders to refrain from delivering remarks at the event, Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party Leader Fannie Lou Hamer spoke truth to power. Carrying no notepad and a hippocampus full of police brutality and Jim Crow racism, she delivered an impassioned proclamation about America’s violent desire to keep Black communities away from the mere thought of peace.
“I question America. Is this America, the land of the free and the home of the brave, where we have to sleep with our telephones off of the hooks because our lives are threatened daily because we want to live as decent human beings, in America?” she asked.
Fearful that Hamer’s testimony would strike such discord within the Democratic Party and the American public, President Lyndon B. Johnson called an impromptu press conference to draw attention away from her remarks. To his dismay, his plan backfired and media outlets around the country set aside time to air Hamer’s comments in their entirety during the evening news hour. At this moment, a woman who health officials forcibly sterilized years prior gave birth to millions of Black and brown changemakers looking to follow in her footsteps.
More than 4,500 days after her landmark appearance at the DNC, Hamer was laid to rest in Sunflower Country, Mississippi. Despite her passing, the words and ideas that she shared throughout her life continue to frighten opponents of progress to this day. Throughout the years, bigoted parents misinformed guardians and calculated far, right-wing pundits have initiated a war against critical race theory. While many of its opponents struggle to explain what they think critical theory is, the teachings of Kimberlé Crenshaw, Michelle Alexander, or anyone that remotely reflects Hamer’s legacy are being removed from classrooms around the country.
“We have successfully frozen their brand—’critical race theory’—into the public conversation and are steadily driving up negative perceptions. We will eventually turn it toxic, as we put all of the various cultural insanities under that brand category,” Christopher F. Rufo of the Manhattan Institute tweeted in March 2021.
Much like Johnson’s attempt to hush the voice of Fannie Lou Hamer, the effort to banish the works of talented educators and writers appears to be backfiring. Now, more than ever, public figures are speaking about the need for discussions about the intersections of race, culture, gender, economics and American history.
Director Christine Swanson and Academy Award nominee Aunjanue Ellis recently joined forces to develop a short film chronicling Hamer’s speech at the 1964 Democratic National Convention in Atlantic City. Titled Fannie, Ellis and Swanson’s collaboration not only pays tribute to her remarks in Atlantic City, but the spirit of the film also embodies the spirit of Hamer’s voting rights activism. Beyond August 22, 1964, Hamer founded the Freedom Farm Collective, created the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party and embarked on two congressional campaigns. Not to mention, she is responsible for coining the phrase, “I’m sick and tired of being sick and tired.” Recently, I spoke to Swanson and Ellis about the creative process that led to this film and what Hamer’s undying legacy means to them.
Ryan Shepard: You’ve both been in incredible projects that chronicle historical events and profile iconic figures. Christine, you’ve worked on The Clark Sisters: First Ladies of Gospel and Love Under New Management. Aunjanue, you’ve worked on films like Ray and limited series like When They See Us. Having been involved in a number of high-level projects like the ones I just named, what criteria does a film or series have to meet in order for you to get involved?
Aunjanue Ellis: Go ahead, miss director.
Christine Swanson: It depends on where you are in your career. The first criteria is saying to myself, “Oh, I’m going to get paid for this? I’ll go.” That’s how I’ve gotten into some of the projects that I’ve done. Once I get into it, I just dive right in, especially when they’re movies. I just love the journey and as long as there is a fascinating element to the storytelling that I can contribute to, then I’m in. I always like to see what I’m going to do at the end of it. I always like to see what I’m going to do at the end of it. I love the challenge of putting a story together from script to delivery.
AE: I worked with Christine on The Clark Sisters: First Ladies of Gospel in 2020 and that was one of the most, if not the most fun, filming experiences that I’ve ever had. I had the opportunity to build a character from top to bottom. I love playing characters and I love doing character work. As an actor, everybody doesn’t always get to play a character. Sometimes you are tasked with playing an iteration of yourself and that’s fine. It’s beautiful. Some actors have made a career out of that, but that’s not that interesting to me because I’m not that interesting. I want to play somebody else. I think that’s what attracts me to a project. Playing a character that fascinates me.
RS: The character that you play in Fannie is definitely fascinating. Like Fannie Lou Hamer, you have roots in Mississippi and spent a good amount of your life there. How important is it for you to be involved in telling the story of an icon who’s from a place that’s also a big part of your life story?
AE: I still live in Mississippi today. However, I often live where I work, especially when I work for an extended period of time. That’s a reality of my profession. If you’re lucky enough to have a professional career in acting, you learn that it really is a nomadic profession. Nevertheless, when they say cut, I go [back to Mississippi]. A lot of times, I’ll get in the car, hop on the highway and go back to Mississippi. That’s my life.
Mississippi is this weird sort of place. Christine has roots there as well. Her father’s family is there. People have this perception of Mississippi as if it’s a third-world country within the United States. Unfortunately, that narrative is pushed by stereotypes and clichés about the state that are not rooted in anything that’s real. At the same time, [that stereotype] is also pushed by the realities of Mississippi. One thing that many people don’t know is that there are a number of people from Mississippi, Fannie Lou Hamer being one of them, that changed the course of electoral politics in this country. To me, it’s essential to know the contributions of Mississippians as a citizen of this country.
RS: Fannie Lou Hamer made a number of unforgettable contributions to this country, including her testimony at the 1964 Democratic National Convention. President Lyndon B. Johnson had attempted to persuade her not to speak at the convention on August 22, 1964, but she went ahead and did it anyway. The fearlessness that she displayed in that moment and so many other moments has allowed her legacy stands out in history. When you think about the adversity that she faced throughout her life, what parts of her personality can you adapt and utilize in your everyday lives?
AE: What I love so much about Mrs. Hamer is that she wasn’t scared of anything or anybody. She embodied the expression, “I ain’t never scared.” She was just fearless and I think that mindset comes from this idea that I don’t have anything to lose, so what am I afraid of? She was also very connected to her faith and to God. I’m paraphrasing here, but one of the scriptures from the Bible states, “If you hold onto your life, you lose your life.” [Fannie Lou Hamer] navigated the world [with that mindset].
CS: Let me add to that. Ryan, you mentioned that the President did not want [Fannie Lou Hamer] to do something and she did it anyway. I want to say that there’s another important layer to the story. [The President] wasn’t the only one [that didn’t want Fannie Lou Hamer] to do what she was really called to do. There were a lot of other people that she battled who looked like her.
Talking about fearlessness, it’s easy for me to do when it’s in service to something else and I feel like that’s how Mrs. Hamer maneuvered. When she connected with Ella Baker and other leaders who were trying to tackle voter suppression, [she was fearless because she working in service to something else]. When we show up in service to something bigger than ourselves, the fear kind of dissipates because other people have gone before us. So, what is it that we can’t do with more tools than they had?
RS: While preparing for this interview, I watched a number of clips and videos about the life of Fannie Lou Hamer, including PBS’ “Fannie Lou Hamer’s Powerful Testimony | Freedom Summer.” In the nearly four-minute PBS clip, Bob Moses pointed out that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. also spoke at the 1964 Democratic National Convention on August 22, 1964. However, he could not have delivered that specific message. Hamer overcame polio, was the youngest of 20 children and experienced a number of other things in her life that led up to that specific moment in her life that was unique to her story. Also, the clip pointed out, as you have both mentioned in our conversation, that her legacy extends far beyond August 22, 1964. Leading up to this interview, I was able to learn about her work with Harry Belafonte, voter registration, efforts, etc. Given that many people don’t learn about this stuff in school, what responsibility, if at all, do you feel to create work that will inform others about history?
AE: It’s all I want to do. It’s my obsession. It’s all I can think about. In my personal experience of going to school for 12 years, I never learned anything about Mrs. Hamer, not even during Black History Month. We learned about George Washington Carver Carter G. Woodson, Rosa Parks and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. I remember seeing their laminated pictures on the wall, but we never learned anything about Fannie Lou Hamer. I went to a very prestigious, predominantly white, liberal, progressive college and not one day did we learn anything about Mrs. Hamer. I don’t believe that it is cynical of me to believe that this [erasure] is intentional. We can this play out in how they’re trying to keep critical race theory out of classrooms in which it doesn’t even exist in the first place. So, I mean it’s everything that I want to do.
There’s something that happened in Mrs. Hamer’s life after her experience in 1964 at the convention [that stuck with me]. She went to Harlem in order to generate some more support for their efforts in Mississippi, so Malcolm X invited her up to [an event] and she spoke in New York. By the way, everybody should read the speech that precedes her speech, as well as her speech.
So, this is what we must do. Ryan, I think this speaks to you a little bit and what you are trying to do because sometimes you do this work and you do it by yourself with very little support. I’ve written a full film about Mrs. Hamer and Christine and we are trying to produce it. In my mind, people should be calling us and asking, “How much money do you want for it?” Unfortunately, that’s not what’s happening. What I’m saying is that there’s loneliness in this. There are all these things that will tell you that it’s not worth doing. Give it up. Don’t try. That’s what Mrs. Hamer faced and then some, but she stayed consistent in what she did even when nobody was paying attention or there were no cameras.
CS: And there are people reaching out, Aunjanue. We just have to talk to them. But what I love about the…
AE: Where the check at?
[Laughter]
AE: We’re working on it. One of the ways that I would characterize Sunflower, which is a feature film of the same story and this is in Aunjanue’s own words, is that it’s a cinematic act of resistance. It is agitation. Those words right there just show you that this is a continuation of a battle that is not finished. The fact that people can even question what she did speaks to the urgency of why this story needs to be told in a way that only Aunjanue Ellis can tell it it’s little ol’ me helping. I don’t say that humbly. I’m just saying that there’s power in connectivity with Mrs. Game, Ella Baker and all of the people that rallied to make something extraordinary out of the ordinary. That’s the goal and it takes a village of like-minded who are not affected by what others say to make that happen.
RS: I’m learning a lot from both of you during the course of this interview and I can’t thank you enough for taking the time to do this interview, especially on a Saturday. With that said, I would be remiss if I did not congratulate Ms. Ellis for earning an Academy Award nomination in honor of her work in King Richard. For Aunjanue, my last question has to do with success. Having appeared in a number of successful projects and earning accolades such as this nomination, what would make you say that you’re successful and you’ve done everything with the talent that you have been blessed with?
AE: Well, the reason I was shaking my head while Christine was saying that there’s no one else but me to tell this story about Mrs. Hamer in 1964 is that I don’t agree. I don’t agree with that. I think that there are many Black women in the world [that could tell this story] because I think that [Mrs. Hamer’s story] speaks to all of us in some way. I just want it to be told by Black women and I say that unapologetically.
Right now, telling her story is my obsession and if I can make this happen, I’ll feel like my living has not been in vain. I just know that this story is about truth and fact. It’s not about narrative or anything else. It’s about facts that have been erased and hidden but need to be pushed to the forefront so we can be better protectors of who we are in this country. As Christine said, that kind of cinematic resistance is what I want to be doing until I can’t breathe anymore.
Editor’s Note: This interview has been edited for brevity and grammatical errors.