The Sit-In: Harry Belafonte Hosts The Tonight Show
World Premiere

The Sit-In: Harry Belafonte Hosts The Tonight Show

2020 Official Selection: Features
Feature | United States | 77 MINUTES | English
Music, Art

While the country was embroiled in a divisive election with racial tensions flaring, Civil Rights activist and trailblazing performer Harry Belafonte guest hosted The Tonight Show for one week in 1968. By then, Johnny Carson had turned this pioneering late night show into one of the most powerful platforms of communication. In an unprecedented move, Belafonte took a predominantly white institution, The Tonight Show, and transformed it into a multicultural and political experience.

Award-winning director Yoruba Richen examines the importance of this lost broadcast history through vibrant interviews with Belafonte, Whoopi Goldberg, Questlove, and guests who appeared that week including Petula Clark, Dionne Warwick, and Freda Payne. The Sit In features rare archival footage, including interviews with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy, which are among the last television appearances before both were assassinated.—Dan Hunt


Cast & Credits
Directed by
Yoruba Richen

Yoruba Richen is an award-winning filmmaker whose work has been featured on PBS, The New York Times, and Frontline. Her latest film, Green Book: Guide to Freedom, premiered on the Smithsonian channel. She is the founding director of the documentary program at the Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY.

Director
Yoruba Richen
Producer
Valerie Thomas, Joan Walsh
Screenwriter
Yoruba Richen, Valerie Thomas, Elia Gasull Balada
Cinematographer
Ian Moubayed, Martina Radwan
Editor
Èlia Gasull Balada
Composer
Wendell Hanes
Executive Producer
Peter Saraf, Leah Holzer, Joy Reid
Associate Producer
Ayesha Nadarajah
Co-Producer
Joseph Borruso

Contacts
Press Contact
Valerie Thomas
Big Beach
Montclair, NJ 07043
Phone: 917 952 2579
vcthomas@mindspring.com
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Part of the Juneteenth programming. Sponsored by:

Co-hosted-by:

NYWIFT Summit: The Creative Industry Radically Reimagined June 22-25, 2021 – 4-6pm ET.

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