The Neutral Ground
a documentary about memory, monuments, and how to break up with the confederacy
#TheNeutralGround is now available worldwide on iTunes, Vimeo, and Google Play. Stream it before your governor bans it.
The Neutral Ground documents New Orleans’ fight over monuments and America’s troubled romance with the Lost Cause.
In 2015, director CJ Hunt was filming the New Orleans City Council’s vote to remove four confederate monuments. But when that removal is halted by death threats, CJ sets out to understand why a losing army from 1865 still holds so much power in America.
See the Film
April 25 | Bologna Arts Center @ Delta State University - Cleveland, MS (Southern Circuit) | (more info)
April 24 | Coleman Center for the Arts - York, AL (Southern Circuit) | (more info)
April 22 | Fisk University/ Global Education Center - Nashville, TN (Southern Circuit) | (more info)
April 19 | Gulf Coast Symphony Inc - Ft. Meyers, FL (Southern Circuit) | (more info)
April 6 | a/perture cinema - Salem, NC (Southern Circuit) | (more info)
April 5 | Bardo Arts Center @ Western Carolina University - Cullowhee, NC (Southern Circuit) | (more info)
April 4 | Mary B. Martin School of the Arts @ East Tennessee State University - Johnson City, TN (Southern Circuit) | (more info)
March 23 | WSLR - Sarasota, FL (Southern Circuit) | (more info)
March 21 | Clayton Center for the Arts - Maryville, TN (Southern Circuit) | (more info)
March 4 | Human Rights Film Festival (Oslo) | (more info)
March 3 | University of North Carolina at Wilmington (Southern Circuit) | (more info)
March 2 | Human Rights Film Festival (Oslo) | (more info)
February 10 | Digital @ Buffalo State | (more info)
February 7-8 | Screen & Teach-in with Antiracist Table | (more info)
October 14-31 | Original Thinkers | (more info)
October 12-13 | Hot Springs Documentary Festival | (tickets)
October 4 | Nashville Film Festival | (tickets)
October 3 | Seattle Docfest (SIFF) | (tickets)
September 29 | The Moth, NYC | (more info)
July 5 | National Broadcast Premiere on POV
July 2 - 8 | Laemmle Theaters Glendale, CA
June 25, 202 | AFI Docs
June 19 | Premiere 2021 Tribeca Festival
The Crew
CJ Hunt
A comedian and filmmaker living in NYC, CJ is currently a field producer on The Daily Show with Trevor Noah. He has also served as a staff writer for A&E's Black and White, and a field producer for BET's The Rundown with Robin Thede. Before working in late night, CJ spent nine years living in New Orleans where - in 2015 - he began filming what he thought would be a quick and easy confederate monument removal. CJ is an alumnus of Firelight Media's Doc Lab and New Orleans Film Festival's Emerging Voices program. He is also a 2020 New America Fellow and a regular host of The Moth. A graduate from Brown University's Africana Studies department, CJ is endlessly fascinated by race and comedy's ability to say what we can't.
Darcy McKinnon
Darcy McKinnon is a documentary filmmaker based in New Orleans. McKinnon's work in documentaries includes the films Maquilapolis, Live, Nude, Girls, UNITE!, “Animals” and The Neutral Ground with CJ Hunt. With a background in education and arts organization leadership, she produces documentary work that focuses on the American South, and is currently in mid-production on Commuted with Nailah Jefferson, and Katie Mathews’ Roleplay, a hybrid play/documentary about student artist responses to campus sexual assault. She also co-directed a doc short, “A Fine Girl,” with support from If/Then. McKinnon's work has been broadcast on POV, LPB and Cinemax, and her current projects have received support from SFFILM, CAAM, Chicken and Egg, Firelight Media, ITVS, Black Public Media, Sundance and Tribeca. Darcy is a co-founder of ALL Y'ALL, with Elaine McMillion Sheldon, an alum of the Impact Partners Producing Fellowship, and one of Filmmaker Magazine’s 2020 25 new faces in independent film.
