Editors: Danielle Statuto, Sarah C. Reeves, and Christian Logan
Foley Artist Chandler Freelander and Foley Mixer Rachel Basset recording at Dodge College
Sound mixing with Thomas Cassetta
Color grade with Caitlin Díaz
Live Grain Texture Mapping Session with the genius Suny Behar
Thank you so much for supporting our film, we absolutely couldn’t have done it without you. Please enjoy these frame grabs from the current cut of AN ACT OF TERROR.
Thank you so much for supporting AN ACT OF TERROR. Your contributions made everything you see in the images below possible. Thank you also to our incredible actors and crew who came together to tell this story with us. We couldn’t have done this without you!
Love,
Ashley Brim Riddle, Chris Riddle and Lizz Lyons
Photo Credits: Behind the scenes photos for Days 1-5 are by the awesome Frank Balthasar.
Here’s a look at some of the brilliant filmmakers who came together to make AN ACT OF TERROR!
OUR WRAP PHOTO!
Olivia Washington, Tonya Pinkins, our awesome ensemble of background actors, our day five Camera Department, Script Supervisor and Director
DP Patrick Jones and Gaffer Cory Skipper
Second AC Sam Kim pinch hitting as our First AC
Director Ashley Brim Riddle and Script Supervisor Jessica Floyd
Property Master Douglas Young and Olivia Washington
Set Costumer Rachael Schlick, Key Make-up Artist Megan Deputy and Mystie Smith
UPM Jonathan Grubbs and Producer Chris Riddle
Associate Producer Kether Abeles
First Team PA Krí Schafer
Special Effects mastermind Larry Bivins
Location Manager Amy Harmon
Producer Lizz Lyons and Olivia Washington
Make-up Department Head Megan Areford
Key Grip Mark Overton and Best Boy Grip Jet Eller
Key Grip Mark Overton and his son, Grip Nellis Overton
DP Patrick Jones, Tonya Pinkins, Rachael Schlick, and Olivia Washington
2nd 2nd Assistant Director Volnerius Rackley
First AC Christian Shonts AKA Shontz-y Cat
Camera PA Sean Crane
Stunt Coordinator Jennifer Badger, Olivia Washington and Karen Reynolds
2nd 2nd Volnerius Rackley directing the background
Boom Operator Aaron Mowrer, Olivia Washington, Gaffer Cory Skipper, and DP Patrick Jones.
Awesome assistant to Olivia Washington and one-time only leader of the background, Michelle Sturdivant
Terrence Clowe, Mystie Smith and Alicia LaShon AKA Henry, Harriett and Charlotte Christian
Olivia Washington, Director Ashley Brim Riddle, Mystie Smith, and Kether Abeles
Tonya Pinkins
Photography by Frank Balthasar
Finding a period appropriate prison took us all over.
Old Chester County Jail AKA Chester County Historical Society
Old Iredell County Jail
**Not pictured: All of the ghosts**
Our search for Ida’s ended in downtown Charlotte. And then we had to find the connecting locations to take us from historic Brattonsville to the city.
Fourth Ward, Charlotte, NC
The residence at Rural Hill
Side street Chester, SC
Downtown Chester, SC
Latta Plantation
**Not pictured: The cat that chased a sheep**
The scenes in the Christian Residence were very specifically blocked in the script. We found a lot of one room cabin options at Rural Hill and Latta Plantation but they didn’t work for our story. When Karl sent photos of the Smith Cabin at Historic Brattonsville, we knew it was the one!
The road to the Christian Home
The Smith Cabin at historic Brattonsville
The Rustic Cabin at Rural Hill
Oh, the places we went! Thanks to our awesome Location Manager Amy Harmon and Location Scout Karl Golden, we visited A LOT of amazing places as we scouted AN ACT OF TERROR. Surprisingly, we saw more schools than anything. And the courtroom turned out to be our biggest challenge.
Colonel William Bratton Home in historic Brattonsville, SC
Another schoolhouse at historic Brattonsville
The Davidson School at Rural Hill
Iredell County Courthouse
Iredell County Courthouse
**Not pictured: The courthouse Amy miraculously found in Stanley, NC.**
Virginia Christian was executed by the Commonwealth of Virginia on August 16th, 1912, the day after her seventeenth birthday. This is the true story that inspired AN ACT OF TERROR.
Virgie’s story is as bleak as it is true and it is undeniably bleak. But I believe there is a great deal of hope in telling it, in sharing it. If our nation and our institutions are to be healed, we must examine stories like Virgie’s. In school we learn that Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves then we skip to the civil rights movement and celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks. We never learn about the thousands of racial terror lynchings of African Americans in the South between Reconstruction and World War II. Or that the rise of legal executions in the South correlates directly with the decline in lynchings in the region. We don’t talk about that civil war. Until we do, our understanding of our past is hollow.
Racial injustice endures because we seem determined to remain blind to its presence in the bedrock of our institutions. Once you encounter a story like Virgie’s, the truth is impossible to ignore. I can’t think of a better medium than film to undertake the herculean task of bringing this history to life.
Virginia Christian was executed by the Commonwealth of Virginia on August 16th, 1912, the day after her seventeenth birthday. This is the true story that inspired AN ACT OF TERROR.
I first heard about Virginia Christian in February 2016 when my dad sent me a book called FORSAKEN by Ross Howell Jr. Howell’s deeply researched historical novel follows 18-year-old reporter Charles Mears as he covers his first murder case, the trial of Virginia Christian for the murder of Ida Belote in Hampton, Virginia.
As I read, I became as obsessed with the grave injustice Virgie faced as the book’s protagonist is. My mind reeled. How did this happen in an American courtroom? Why haven’t I ever heard of a 16-year-old girl who died in the electric chair? When did it stop being legal to execute children? What has been done to make our institutions more fair so that something like this never happens again?
I hope that Virgie’s story will spark a conversation about the shameful parts of our history--Jim Crow, lynching, terror, and racism--that we must squarely face in order to honestly build a society in which there is true equality.
The Commonwealth of Virginia sentenced 16 year old Virginia Christian to death by electrocution in 1912. AN ACT OF TERROR tells Christian's story from her point of view. Through her eyes we see how our flawed our institutions and criminal justice system can be.
Written by: Ashley Brim Riddle and Rachel Rush
Directed by: Ashley Brim Riddle
Produced by: Chris Riddle
Follow us on Twitter and Instagram @anactofterror and on Tumblr as we prepare to shoot An Act of Terror and to learn more about Virginia Christian.
