Reception in Cinema: 6:30 p.m., with live music by vocalist Donna Robbins (the niece of Boyd Lee Dunlop), accompanied by pianist Joe Brancato.
Screening starts at 7:30 p.m. FREE & Open to the Public. Please enter through lobby outside gallery and take elevator to basement.
Following its 2014 annual meeting earlier in the day, members of the WNY Area Labor Federation of the AFL-CIO will reassemble at Hallwalls for a free public screening of Robert Townsend's 2002 made-for-TV film 10,000 Black Men Named George, "the powerful true story of the first black-controlled union, the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters.
"When the Great Depression struck America in the 1920s, finding work was hard, but if you were poor and black it was virtually impossible. Working as a porter for the Pullman Rail Company was an option, but it meant taking home a third as much as white employees and working some days for free. You could forget about being called by your real name—all black porters were simply called 'George' after George Pullman!
"Asa Philip Randolph, a black journalist and socialist trying to establish a voice for these forgotten workers, agrees to fight for the Pullman porters' cause and form the first black union in America. Livelihoods and lives would be put at risk in the attempt to gain 10,000 signatures of the men known only as 'George.' This is the true story of how a courageous leader came to be known as 'the most dangerous man in America.'"
Starring Andre Braugher (also one of the film's Executive Producers) as A. Philip Randolph, Charles S. Dutton, Mario Van Peebles, Brock Peters, and Carla Brothers.
(Robert Townsend, 2002, 80 min.)