Bed-Stuy Filmmaker Sparked By 'Duty' To Address Police Violence

BED-STUY, BROOKLYN — For filmmaker Lawrence "LAW" Watford, every time a story about a Black American killed by police showed up on the news, anger was quickly met with a need to get his thoughts down on paper.

Over the years — as names like Alton Sterling, Philando Castile and Antwon Rose appeared in headlines — Watford thought about writing a screenplay about the subject so many times, that at one point he convinced himself he'd already done it.

"Around November or October of last year, the idea was so fresh in my mind that I actually thought I had already written it," Watford told Patch.

A quick search through his computer revealed that, no, he hadn't yet written out the vision for a movie in his head. But Watford said that's when he knew that it was time.

"I almost felt a duty to write it," Watford said. "Once I realized I hadn't already, it only took me an hour and a half to write."

That moment of release for Watford, a year later, has resulted in a short film he hopes will do the same for viewers across his native Brooklyn and the country.

"Catharsis," shot with a skeleton crew in Watford's Bed-Stuy home and a nearby school, tells the story of a Black mother who confronts the district attorney who refused to prosecute the officer responsible for her son's death.

The storyline, Watford said, has only grown in significance since it was shot late last year, especially considering the Black Lives Matter protests that erupted this summer following the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor.

Even details like focusing the story on the district attorney rather than police seems even more relevant now, Watford said. Kentucky Attorney General and prosecutor Daniel Cameron is largely blamed for not pursing murder charges for the cops involved in Taylor's death.

"It is kind of eerie that it is so spot on," Watford said. "But it also makes me realize that it was a necessary place to take the conversation."

Watford rewrote the story to focus on the district attorney after a first draft where the plot had been written around a police chief. Focusing on the prosecutor, was a way to highlight the "entire system that supports toxic policing," rather than just law enforcement, Watford said.

He also switched the main character from a Black father to a Black mother since those first drafts, Watford said.

"I'm a Black father, so for me, it was personal — looking at my wife and my mom, I think there's something so deep about the nature of a relationship between a mother and a child," he said. "I thought that was a much richer story to tell...to kind of put you in a place where you can hopefully empathize with that as a parent."

And if the first reaction to the movie — through a socially distanced screening at a Greenpoint cafe last week — is any indication, Watford's message came through loud and clear.

"The one consistent word [I heard] was 'powerful,'" Watford said.

"Catharsis" will be released online through Watford's company Divine Write Pictures on Dec. 23 and can be found on its website, YouTube, Facebook and Instagram pages.