If you’re a regular viewer of PBS programming, chances are that you’re familiar with the work of filmmaker Ken Burns. From Brooklyn Bridge to The National Parks: America’s Best Idea, Burns’s work is synonymous with informative and investigative reporting. VPM is excited to announce that Burns will be coming to Richmond’s Altria Theater to help promote his new film, The American Revolution, on Sunday, Mar. 23 at 7 p.m.
Attendees can purchase tickets here beginning at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, Jan. 15.
Burns will spend two days in Virginia beginning on Sunday, Mar. 23, when Ken will join others at St. John’s Church in Richmond for a reenactment of Patrick Henry’s famous “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death” speech, timed to the 250th anniversary of the speech. The event will begin at 1:30 p.m., and tickets are sold out. However, the event will be livestreamed at HistoricStJohnsChurch.org.
Later on Sunday, VPM will host a special preview of The American Revolution at the Altria Theater in Richmond at 7 p.m., followed by a panel discussion with Ken, his co-director Sarah Botstein and three historians featured in the film, including Rick Atkinson, Christopher Brown and Jane Kamensky.
On Monday, Mar. 24, Burns will join PBS CEO Paula Kerger at A Common Cause to All, the largest gathering of nationwide organizers of the anniversary of America’s founding, hosted by Colonial Williamsburg Foundation and VA250. The event will begin at 1 p.m. at the Williamsburg Lodge Conference Center.
Tuesday evening, Burns will close out his time in Virginia when the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation hosts a special outdoor preview of The American Revolution for the general public. The event begins at 8 p.m. and will take place outside the Governor’s Palace (weather permitting). Burns will be joined by his two co-directors, Sarah Botstein and David Schmidt (who also grew up in Colonial Williamsburg).
The American Revolution, a new six-part, 12-hour documentary directed by Ken Burns, Sarah Botstein and David Schmidt explores the country’s founding and its eight-year War for Independence. Thirteen colonies on the Atlantic Coast rose in rebellion, won their independence and established a new form of government that radically reshaped the continent and inspired centuries of independence movements and democratic reforms around the globe.
The film will premiere on Sunday, November 16 and air for six consecutive nights through Friday, November 21st at 8:00-10:00 p.m. ET (check local listings) on PBS. The full series will be available to stream beginning Sunday, November 16 at PBS.org and on the PBS App.
An expansive look at the virtues and contradictions of the war and the birth of the United States of America, The American Revolution follows dozens of figures from a wide variety of backgrounds. Viewers will experience the war through the memories of the men and women who experienced it: the rank-and-file Continental soldiers and American militiamen (some of them teenagers), Patriot political and military leaders, British Army officers, American Loyalists, Native soldiers and civilians, enslaved and free African Americans, German soldiers in the British service, French allies and various civilians living in North America, Loyalist as well as Patriot, including many made refugees by the war.