CHICAGO — Just in time for the 2016 election, a new film is using Chicago as a lens for the burning racial resentment and fear that grip American politics, according to writer/producer Paul Carr.
"Busted City" takes place more than three decades ago, during the lead-up to the election that would make Harold Washington the city's first black mayor, but the story's themes and subtext could hardly be more relevant today, Carr said.
"When you look at police brutality and everything that's going on with Black Lives Matter, there were a lot of echoes of that back then," Carr said. "There was so much entrenched opposition and virulent racism against Harold Washington, it raised a lot of these familiar issues of whose city this, whose society this is."
Carr originally wrote "Busted City" as a stage play, showing it at Prop Thtr, 3502 N. Elston Ave., in Avondale during the 2008 and 2012 election seasons. The screen adaptation marks his fist foray into filmmaking.
The new medium allowed him to splice original campaign footage and advertisements into the story, he said. But the majority of scenes were shot inside Margaret's bar and restaurant, 5134 W. Irving Park Road, in Portage Park.
Carr released a video showing testimonials from long-time Chicago personalities like WXRT deejay Lin Brehmer and Cook County Clerk David Orr, who said the film "realistically portrayed the fear, the anger ... on the part of those people who were terrified of the fact the Harold Washington could become mayor."
"Busted City" premieres at 8 p.m. Friday at the Patio Theater, 6008 W. Irving Park Road. Tickets are available online for $5 each.
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