Interview:
Heather Courtney,
director,
"For the Record"
Directed by former Austinite Heather Courtney, the short documentary For the Record chronicles the financial struggles faced by a weekly newspaper in the small Texas Panhandle town of Canadian. On the eve of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, The Canadian Record faces an uncertain future as its ad revenue continues to dwindle. When the pandemic shuts down Canadian, and businesses start to close, editor/publisher Laurie Ezzell Brown and her loyal staff face an uphill battle to keep the newspaper running while maintaining a balance between its unbiased reporting and left-leaning editorials on both the pandemic and the 2020 presidential election in a community that has grown increasingly more conservative during the Donald Trump administration. For the Record will screen at 11 a.m. May 28 as part of the Austin Film Society’s Docs Days 2023 Texas Shorts package. Former Austin-based documentary filmmakers Heather Courtney, who now lives in L.A., previously Where Soldiers Come From and co-directed The Unafraid. Breaking the News, a documentary feature about Austin’s The 19th news organization, Heather Courtney co-directed with Princess A. Hairston and Chelsea Hernandez, will premiere June 8 at the Tribeca Festival. Aired: May 16, 2023. Web sites: https://www.austinfilm.org/screening/texas-shorts/ https://www.newday.com/filmmakers/heather-courtney |
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