See Me Series: Maya Angelou's Georgia, Georgia
In a new initiative to explore and discuss diverse creative media work, the Department of Mass Media launches the See Me Series with a 50th-anniversary screening of Maya Angelou’s first film and a conversation with its leading actor Dirk Benedict.
Georgia, Georgia is a 1972 independent film written by Maya Angelou. It is the first original feature film screenplay solely credited to an African American woman.
Angelou used the framework of a romantic encounter to tell a much more complex story involving gender, race, sexuality, celebrity, and class. It is a film that was ahead of its time culturally, politically, and socially. It is as relevant today as it was 50 years ago.
Produced by Jack Jordan and Quentin Kelly, the film was the first of three from their company Jorkel, Inc. Jordan, an African American with connections to creative personnel and performers, and Kelly, an Irish American with connections to marketing and business financing, wanted to tell stories from the African American perspective and offer audiences an alternative to early 1970s blaxploitation films.
The film starred Tony-nominated actress Diana Sands and film newcomer actor Dirk Benedict, who would go on to have a successful stage, film, and television career that included performances of two iconic television characters: Starbuck on Battlestar Galactica and Templeton Peck (Face) on The A-Team.
The film is rated R and contains adult material as defined by the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA).
Dirk Benedict on meeting Maya Angelou in May 1971. (From his book Confessions of a Kamikaze Cowboy)
Photographer Michael Winters (Dirk Benedict) and pop star Georgia Martin (Diana Sands) discuss what being a celebrity really means.
Georgia Martin (Diana Sands) is a world-famous singer who shows one face to the world and a very different one to herself.
Georgia’s chaperone Mrs. Anderson (Minnie Gentry) and Georgia’s manager Herbert Thompson (Roger Furman) grow concerned over Georgia’s involvement with Michael.
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