More than whistling Dixie: New film gives Civil War victory to Confederates

LAWRENCE -- Kevin Willmott, script writer, film producer and assistant professor at the University of Kansas, likes to say that Trent Lott might still be Senate majority leader had he seen Willmott's newest film, "Confederate States of America."

Willmott's film will premiere in Lawrence at 8 p.m. Friday, Feb. 21, at Liberty Hall, 642 Massachusetts St., as part of the Langston Hughes February Festival celebrating Kansas writers and artists.

Using a faux documentary style, "CSA" examines what the United States would be like if the South had won the Civil War. In "CSA," slavery is alive and well in modern America. Willmott describes his satire as probably the most controversial film never to have sex, nudity or violence, due to the topic -- slavery.

Willmott hopes his film will prompt audiences to think and talk about slavery and racism and their impact on our society more than 135 years after the war. He will lead a discussion following the 100-minute film.

In previous screenings in Salina, Kansas City, South Dakota and Springfield, Ill., the film has been well received. "Some people find it very liberating. One person said to me, 'It's about time,'" Willmott says. A few walked out. In Illinois, some viewers wanted copies of the film to use as a tool to teach history and race relations.

"CSA" is not yet on the market as a video. Willmott started filming "CSA" with a grant from National Black Programming Consortium, a PBS affliate. The consortium will have official first look at the film.

Willmott deliberately wrote a satirical script hoping to find a popular market for a film on slavery.

"Slavery is a topic that doesn't sell well in Hollywood," he says. Although Willmott has sold several scripts to Hollywood producers and has won awards for his work, his scripts involving slavery remain unproduced. Producers told him, "'Beloved' didn't do well. 'Amistad' didn't do well." Most films about the Civil War focus on military and political heroes or details of battles but exclude slavery, Willmott says.

"I wanted to find a way around Hollywood's lack of interest in producing films about slavery and thought about a script based on what if the South had won the war," he says. As he watched the Ken Burns documentary on the Civil War, Willmott was intrigued by a reference to a plan by the South to build a tropical empire and began to ask "what if?"

Although slavery in modern America seems absurd, Willmott says his film never winks at the camera. "We play it totally straight," he says. "We worked hard to make this film a believeable, seamless document that takes you into this world and doesn't allow you to step out of it. The absurdity of it, the humor, comes from, I think, taking it seriously."

Willmott created the BBS, a fictitious British television network, to tell the history of this country from the South's victory at Gettysburg through the present day. BBS producers interview modern historians as well as use old photos and film footage. The BBS producers discover footage of interviews with Lincoln -- who was not assassinated but rather exiled to Canada in Willmott's script.

Willmott sees a parallel in his passion to raise public consciousness about slavery and racism with Stanley Kubrick's message on nuclear war in "Dr. Strangelove."

"Probably nothing is more serious than nuclear war and probably nothing more serious in this country than slavery," Willmott says. The absurdity of Strangelove allowed audiences to deal with a serious topic and yet "make us deal with the darkest regions of our own consciousness in many ways."

"Trent Lott is us," Willmott says, noting that denial of the impact of slavery in our society continues to victimize Americans. "The South lost the war, but they sold us on their way of life -- segregating the races."

"CSA" was borne out of Willmott's belief that American history must be discussed and that too little is known of our history of slavery and racism.

For example, Willmott asks: "How did Kansas, a free state, become segregated? Or how did Lawrence, a city founded by abolitionists, become segregated? Why is it the Topeka Board of Education case? You would think it would be the Mississippi Board of Education case."

Willmott's previous films include "Ninth Street," winner of the Independent Film Channel Award and based on Willmott's experiences growing up in Junction City.