| The Reentry National Media Outreach Campaign offers media tools and resources to support informed discussion, decision making, and action about solution-based reentry programs that foster public safety and support healthy communities. We encourage you to review the diverse materials and consider how you may be able to use them effectively. |
| The Reentry National Media Outreach Campaign acts as a catalyst to encourage solution-based reentry activities. Review this chronicle of public television and community events/actions to gain ideas on what may work in your arena. |
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Production Notes
Nomadic Pictures Ltd. is a television and film production company, based in Chicago, that is owned and founded by Oscar nominated and National Emmy Award winning Producer/ Director/ Writer Tod Lending. The mission of the company is to create innovative programming that engages the viewer and provokes critical thought. The company produces documentaries that captivate, entertain, and challenge the viewer on pressing and significant social, cultural, and historical themes. Nomadic tells character-driven stories with a strong point of view and highly creative approach, utilizing the film and video medium to its fullest potential. Nomadic Pictures produced the national and international award winning three-part national PBS documentary series, Produced, Directed and Written by Tod Lending, entitled No Time To Be A Child. The series explores the lives of children growing up with urban violence, poverty as a form of violence and violence in the home. Each program focuses on resilient young people overcoming their circumstances and tells their stories through their eyes. Nomadic Pictures also completed production on a feature length documentary Produced, Directed and Written by Tod Lending, and licensed by HBO, entitled Legacy. This unprecedented documentary studies three generations of women in one African-American family over a period of four years. The story is told from their point of view and examines their lives as they recover from the killing of a son/grandson, overcome drug abuse, leave welfare behind, and eventually move out of the projects and into a home of their own. Finally, Nomadic Pictures is presently developing several projects including a non-fiction feature focusing on a death penalty case, a non-fiction music feature, a biography, and a series on artists. Tod Lending is an Academy Award nominated and national Emmy award winning producer/director/writer whose work has aired nationally on ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, HBO; has been screened and awarded at national and international festivals; and has been televised internationally in Europe and Asia. He is the recipient of numerous awards including a national Emmy for Outstanding Children's Special, Casey Medal for Meritorious Journalism, CINE Gold Eagle, Golden Apple, the New York Festival World Medal, the Innovation in Documentary Award, to name a few. He is the president and founder of Nomadic Pictures, a film and television company based in Chicago. Nomadic Pictures |
From
December 2001 to January 2002, I began pre-interviewing subjects
for OMAR & PETE. I was looking for an individual who is participating
in the Baltimore Reentry program and who is articulate, committed
to making a change, has family with whom he wants to reunite (brothers
and sisters, nieces and nephews, in the case of Leon), and has
a long record of incarceration. I wanted to find someone whose
record, taken at face value, would indicate that there isn’t
a hope in the world for him, but whose actions and drive to change
will hopefully prove otherwise.
After
pre-interviewing over 75 men, I chose Leon Mason, who is also known
as Omar. On February 1, 2002, I began filming Leon while he was
still incarcerated in the Maryland Transitional Center prison.
The Maryland Department of Corrections allowed me full access to
his life behind bars. After filming him in prison over a period
of six weeks, I then filmed his release on March 15. Leon has been
in and out of prison from the time he was 17, never out longer
than a year. Now, at the age of 47, he was finishing a ten-year
sentence for armed robbery and was participating in the Reentry
program with the hope that this program will help him break his
30-year cycle of incarceration.
On
the day of Leon’s release, when he entered his transitional
house, I met my second subject, his good friend and roommate, William “Pete” Duncan.
Pete is from the same neighborhood as Leon and has a similar history
of incarceration – 30 years in and out, never out longer
than six months. On the night of Leon’s release, Pete was
in his 12th month of being released and on parole. He was also
participating in the Reentry program and had set a record for the
amount of time that he had been free from prison. For both men,
drug addiction was the major reason they broke the law and spent
so many years behind bars. On the day of Leon’s release,
I also began filming his two case managers, Marshall Collins (who
was formerly incarcerated as well as a and former addict) and La
Tonya Johnson. The film explores their relationships with Leon
and Pete.