Tag: Stephen Curry

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Ken Jacobson’s Reflections on HSDFF’s America250 Series, Set to Kick Off Thursday April 23 at UAPB

NOTE:

  • We have several seats left in our 15-seat shuttle leaving from Hot Springs to attend the event at UAPB. If you would like to reserve a spot, please email ken@hsdfi.org as soon as possible.

SPECIAL UAPB PASS OFFER:

  • For all those attending the UAPB event, we are offering a ONE-TIME PASS SALE of $297 for our All Access Pass and $175 for our Film Buff passes for the 2026 HSDFF on Oct. 9 – 17. (Over $125 discount on All Access and $75 discount on Film Buff.) You must be present to receive the special QR discount code.

One of the things about writing grants for a nonprofit organization is that, because grant deadlines often come well in advance of the programs for which you are seeking support, you have to bring a certain amount of imagination to the process. What programs do I envision putting on a year or more from now? What themes and topics might be resonant with audiences? Who are the partners that I might like to approach as co-presenters? The process is a useful one because it forces you to think beyond the day-to-day realities of the organization to dream about where you might be headed — and why.

Thankfully, when I applied for National Endowment for the Arts support back in 2025, the NEA itself provided a couple of very useful guideposts. First, they were keen to accept proposals from organizations seeking with their programs to celebrate America’s 250th anniversary and the Declaration of Independence. That was a relative no-brainer for me, as I loved the idea of marking our nation’s anniversary in some way, using the medium of documentary storytelling as the vehicle for doing so.

Thus, we proposed a documentary screening series to be held throughout the state of Arkansas from April through July. And, now with generous support from the NEA, that series kicks off on April 23rd with the launch of our America250 celebration at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff. On that evening, we are partnering with the University and Hot Springs’ own Gateway Community Association to put on the UAPB Film Festival, plus The Baddest Speechwriter of All, a new short documentary directed by two-time Oscar-winner and HSDFF alum Ben Proudfoot and basketball icon Stephen Curry.

In a nice bit of overlapping priorities, the NEA was encouraging its grantees to partner with HBCUs (Historically Black Colleges and Universities) just as I was thinking of ways to team up with the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff, a 153-year-old 1890 Land-Grant HBCU. UAPB is the oldest HBCU in Arkansas and the only one that is a public university.

We benefitted from more good timing when it turned out that UAPB was planning to hold its annual UAPB Film Festival at the same time that we were proposing a documentary film screening at the university. So, we decided to combine forces. We would curate a special night of films, including new UAPB student-directed films along with a new documentary short to be programmed by HSDFF.

So, what documentary to show? Once again, fate shined upon us. I happened to see Ben Proudfoot’s sublime new documentary short at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. Ben, a two-time Oscar-winner (and HSDFF jury prize winner), has an amazing ability to find remarkable people to profile and a unique creative approach to bring those stories to life. The Baddest Speechwriter of All is the latest proof of that. The film, also directed by Stephen Curry, profiles Dr. Clarence B. Jones, a lawyer, speechwriter and close aide to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Clarence B. Jones at the Lincoln Memorial.

And there we have it — the connective tissue to America250. In 1958, King delivered a stirring commencement address at Arkansas AM&N College, now UAPB. Five years later, in August 1963, Jones would write the first part of the famous “I Have a Dream” speech that King delivered on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. In that speech, King said, “When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men — yes, Black men as well as white men — would be guaranteed the unalienable rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

Those words — and even more important — the struggles and achievements of the Civil Rights Movement would help bring the U.S. closer to the ideals that the Founding Fathers signed on to 250 years ago. Now, that’s something to celebrate.

Please join us on Thursday, April 23 at the SJ Parker 1890 Extension Complex auditorium at 2300 L.A. “Prexy” Davis Drive for the kickoff of our America250 series. The event is free, but we encourage registration here.

There will be a reception at 5:00 PM, doors open at 5:30 PM and the program begins at 6:00 PM. We are thrilled to be hosting Tim Johnson, one of the editors of The Baddest Speechwriter of All for a Q&A following the screening of the film.

Special thanks to Mary Hester-Clfton, Director of Communications at UAPB and Randy Kelley, Television Program Manager UAPB TV.

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Q&A with Tim Johnson, Editor of THE BADDEST SPEECHWRITER OF ALL

Editor Tim Johnson

We’re so looking forward to having editor Tim Johnson join us for The UAPB Film Festival & THE BADDEST SPEECHWRITER OF ALL. In anticipation of his visit, we asked him a few questions about his work on the Sundance Grand Jury Prize-winning film and collaborating with co-directors Ben Proudfoot and Stephen Curry.

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What was the process for working with the directors on this film? Was the edit driven by a clear narrative arc from the onset or did it develop through working with the interview footage of Clarence B. Jones?

We started with our material from Clarence, which was an eight hour long interview completed over the course of a couple days. In addition to the main interview, our archival team dug up a deep library of footage from the Civil Rights Movement, and started scouring to see where we could find Clarence, ultimately yielding a few shots that even Clarence himself hadn’t seen.

Dr. Clarence B. Jones

The narrative arc took a while for us to crack—we knew that the heart of the story needed to be about Clarence’s relationship with Dr. King and how that changed the course of his life, but we also wanted to show Clarence’s impact on the history we’ve all come to know. Staying laser focused on these parts of the story was our biggest challenge as Clarence is such a gifted storyteller and his own life is such a grand tale. It took some experimenting and cutting several scenes that we liked to get the film where we wanted it to be.

You’ve worked with Ben Proudfoot before on FINAL COPY OF ILON SPECHT. What was similar and what was different working with him on this film?

Ben Proudfoot

Ben is such a thorough and dedicated filmmaker, and he puts his entire effort into every facet of each project. He’s relentless in crafting films in a bespoke way that suits each storyteller and their story. 

The big difference with this one is the scope. This film, being set in such a pivotal moment in American history, required a lot of research because we felt a responsibility to get it right. 

What was your collaboration with Steph Curry like? What drove the decision to include his voice in asking questions?

Stephen Curry | Credit: Michael Schwartz

As you can imagine I haven’t worked with a director like Steph before. This film would not exist without him because Clarence’s mentorship of Steph was the genesis of the whole project. 

I was interfacing with Ben in the office, and he would review cuts with Steph between games and while he was on the road. Steph offered notes to help us fill story holes, and also had some fun ideas regarding the animations to help bring some of these moments to life with active camera movements. 

As soon as we tried a cut using Steph’s voice asking questions, we knew we had to keep it. There’s a certain intimacy that it offers from the beginning: if Steph Curry is sitting down to listen to this guy, maybe I should too.

It’s a snapshot of the whole project and how Steph is using his platform to lift up someone who inspires him. 

We love animation director Daniel Bruson’s animations in the film. What was it like to work with them and how did they fit into the editorial process?

Daniel Bruson and his team of animators painted 3000 watercolor frames for this film, and our other editor Nick Wright oversaw that process.

Animation from THE BADDEST SPEECHWRITER OF ALL

I thought the animations gave the film an impressionistic quality that fit perfectly with the reflective nature of Clarence’s memory, and I was blown away when I saw it all together.

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