Film screening – The Interview

Dear Friends,

On Monday, May 9^th, Bedford Playhouse will screen The Interview, a powerful 20-minute documentary featuring a group of formerly incarcerated people who discuss the broken parole process and what it’s like to try to convince a group of people that you’re more than the worst thing you ever did. The event is co-hosted by Woman 2 Woman, Release Aging People in Prison (RAPP), and the New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU), lower Hudson Valley. A panel discussion will be held afterwards.

The Interview asks viewers to confront their feelings about justice and mercy while revealing the heavy toll our current legal system takes on incarcerated people and their families. According to Carol Parker, who leads W2W’s advocacy efforts, “Two important bills that could have a profound impact on the parole process in our state — Elder Parole and Fair & Timely Parole — are stalled in NY State Senate and Assembly committees despite already having the votes for passage. We hope this film raises awareness of how the system keeps people in prison well beyond their rehabilitation, preventing them from making significant contributions to their families and their communities and costing NY State taxpayers over $500 million every year.” 

Brandon Holmes, Hudson Valley Regional Director at the NYCLU and a leader in grassroots campaigns to end mass incarceration, will act as Moderator of the panel. Participants include:

• Michelle Lewin, Executive Director of the Parole Preparation Project, who has trained hundreds of volunteers and worked alongside people serving life sentences in NY State prisons in their struggle for parole release;
• Dorothy Muller, who spent 10 years inside Bedford Hills Correctional Facility as a volunteer chaplain and is a co-founder of W2W;
• Jose Saldana, Director of RAPP, who was released from NY State prison in 2018 after 38 years of incarceration and 4 parole denials;
• Mark Shervington, Statewide Advocacy Associate for RAPP, who served 29 years in NY State prisons on a 15 years-to-life sentence;
• Roslyn D. Smith, Program Manager for V-Day, a nonprofit dedicated to ending violence against women and girls, who uses her personal experience from long term incarceration as a vehicle for her work as a criminal justice reform advocate.

The screening will start at 7:00. Here’s a link to purchase tickets, which we encourage you to do as soon as possible: bit.ly/interview-tickets

We hope to see many of you there.

Best,

Nancy Gernert

Co-Founder, Woman 2 Woman