Film Version of "A Lesson before Dying"

Last week, to kick off the celebration of the 50th anniversary of Ernest Gaines' first novel publication, Catherine Carmier, Dr. Matthew Teutsch and the Ernest J. Gaines Center's graduate assistant Jennifer Morrison appeared on KRVS's Apres Midi and WRKF's The Jim Engster Show. Follow the links above to listen to those interviews.

Last Wednesday, the center kicked off it's events with the film showing of The Sky is Gray at Lafayette Public Library's South Regional Branch. Tomorrow night (September 24), there will be a film screening and discussion of the film version of Gaines' 1993 classic A Lesson before Dying. The film earned two Emmy's in 1999 for Outstanding Made-for-Television Movie and for Outstanding Writing for a Mini-Series or Movie. Around the same time as the film's premier, playwright Romulus Linney, in 2000, premiered the stage adaptation of A Lesson before Dying at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival. A video of him discussing the adaptation is below.

A Lesson before Dying, as has been discussed on this blog previously, is an important book. It was chosen, in 1997, to be part of Oprah Winfrey's Book Club, and it won the National Book Critic's Circle Award in 1993.

Make plans to join us to celebrate the 15th anniversary of this monumental film. Details of the upcoming events can be found on last Tuesday's blog post.