A Christmas Family Tragedy
On Thursday, March 29 at 7:00 PM, the Fine Arts Theatre will be screening "A Christmas Family Tragedy - Legends of the 1929 Lawson Family Murders: A Southern Documentary." Tickets will be $8.00 ($5.75 for seniors) and the show will be followed by a Q&A session with the filmmaker.
The new film by Break of Dawn Productions, 'A Christmas Family Tragedy', a feature length historic true crime documentary about the notorious Lawson Family Massacre of Christmas Day 1929 in Stokes County, NC, deep in the heart of Mayberry country. The film explores the legends and myths surrounding the murders, and what they mean to the remaining family and community now.
On Christmas Day, 1929, a widely respected, affluent tobacco farmer named Charlie Lawson brutally murdered his wife, 6 of his 7 children, and then himself; his eldest son, Arthur, aged 18, was sent to the store to buy more shotgun shells just before the violence broke out. Never so much a 'who-dunnit' as a resounding 'Why?!', this mystery has inspired classic bluegrass murder ballads, ghost stories, family feuds, and overcapacity
crowds for annual retellings of the story.
But a heritage of silence follows the mystery, often with deadly consequences, in a bucolic rural community unable to come to terms with its darker side. The ballad used to be sung as a warning to the wives and kids in this area to behave or else; now it is starting to be sung as a warning to abusers, to where their malevolent actions could lead.
To demonstrate our commitment to using history as a tool to build a better future, we're setting aside a healthy percentage of the profits of this film to benefit local domestic violence organizations, beginning with Stokes Family Violence Services, where we look to get the county's first battered women's shelter over the hump and into operation before the beginning of the next school year.
The film is available on DVD at www.bodproductions.com and is currently on tour for special screenings throughout the south. For more information on screenings, the film, or the tragedy, visit the website or contact Eric Calhoun at eric.2birds1stone@gmail.com.