Wayland Rudd (Moscow), a singer and jazz musician, whose father, Wayland Rudd, Sr. an actor frustrated with a lack of opportunities in America, sailed for Moscow in 1928 with Langston Hughes.  He renounced his American citizenship and became a naturalized Soviet.  He appeared in many Soviet films and was the first black actor to portray Othello in Russian.  

MaryLouise Patterson (Los Angeles), a pediatrician, daughter of William Patterson and Louise Thompson. William Patterson, a lawyer, joined the Communist Party and went to the Soviet Union in 1928. He returned to the United States and became a prominent civil rights activist  who represented the Scottsboro Boys and in later years, the Black Panthers and Angela Davis.  Louise Thompson Patterson was the personal assistant of Marxist theoretician, Herbert Apheker.

Talib Abdus-Shaid (Washington, D.C.),a lawyer, grandson of Williana Burroughs, a political activist who went to the Soviet Union and worked  as a radio reporter during WWII. She returned to America in 1945. Talib’s father spent his formative years in Moscow and was devoted to Russian culture till the end of his life. 

Carola Burroughs (New York), a writer, is also a granddaughter of Williana Burroughs. She has been creating an archive of her family history. 

James Patterson (Washington, D.C.), poet, was a Soviet child movie star and son of Lloyd Patterson who went to the Soviet Union in 1932 with Langston Hughes and stayed. He became a stage set designer and then a journalist for Radio Moscow, broadcasting to English-speaking listeners abroad.

APPEARING IN THE FILM

Harry Belafonte

Known the world over as a singer, songwriter, actor, and activist, Harry Belafonte, the “King of Calypso” has long been associated with the civil rights movement.

Vladimir Pozner

Raised in New York City and living today in Moscow, Vladimir Pozner is a well-known journalist and TV personality who often provides commentary on the Soviet Union. 

Vladimir Alexandrov, Professor of Slavic Language and Literature, Yale University, Vladimir Alexandrov is the author of a 2013 bestseller “The Black Russian”. He is a part of Advisory Board of the Black Russians.

Allison Blakely, Professor of History Emeritus, Boston University. He taught at Howard University for thirty years. He is an author of Russia and the Negro: Blacks in Russian History and Thought.  In 2010 President Obama appointed him to a six-year term on the National Council on the Humanities. He is a part of Advisory Board of the Black Russians.

Joy Gleason Carew, Associate Professor of Pan-African Studies and Associate Director of the International Center at the University of Louisville,Joy Carew is the author of Blacks, Reds, and Russians: Sojourners in Search of the Soviet Promise. She is a part of Advisory Board of the Black Russians.

Jelani Cobb, Associate Professor of History and Director of the Institute for African American Studies at University of Connecticut,  William Jelani Cobb is an American writer, author and educator. He is a part of Advisory Board of the Black Russians. 

Victor Shenderovich, A popular Russian satirist, writer, and radio host, Victor Shenderovich is best known as an outspoken critic of Vladimir Putin. He is also a columnist for The New Times, a liberal Russian weekly.

Harold D. Weaver. Principal Curator of The BlackFilm Project and The ChinaFilm Project, Harold Weaver is a Non-Resident Fellow at the Du Bois Research Institute. He is a part of Advisory Board of the Black Russians.

ADVISORY BOARD  

Juliane Furst,  a senior Lecturer in Modern European History, University of Bristol. Juliane Furst is he author of Stalin’s Last Generation: Soviet Post-War Youth and the Emergence of Mature Socialism.

Marlene Sanders, three-time Emmy award-winning, correspondent, producer, and former news executive, Marlene Sanders broke barriers for women throughout her career. She teaches journalism at New York University.

Rashidah Ismaili, a writer of short stories, plays and poetry, is the second vice-president of Pen and Brush, an organization founded in 1894 that is dedicated to supporting women working the fields of literary, visual and performing arts. 

Krishen Mehta, co-chair of the Advisory Board of Global Financial Integrity, contributes articles on development and social equity issues to the Japan Times and the International Herald Tribune.

Pamela Newkirk, Professor of Journalism, New York University, is the author of Letters from Black America. Her articles have  been published in The New York Times, The Nation andThe Washington Post. 

Meredith Roman, author of Opposing Jim Crow: African Americans and the Soviet Indictment of U.S. Racism, 1928-1937, teaches at State University of New York.

Romy Taylor,Visiting Assistant Professor, Department of Russian and Slavic Studies, University of Arizona has been working on a book about  African-American women and men who emigrated to the USSR in the 1930s.

For other contributors see our website: http://redpalettepictures.com/docs/Black-Russians-Advisory-Board.pdf

MEDIA ATTENTION 

The project has already received a considerable amount of interest from media in the USA, UK, and Russia and most recently made the front page of the Los Angeles Times: http://www.latimes.com/world/great-reads/la-fg-c1-black-russian-americans-20141119-story.html#page=1

“A dream of racial equality behind the Iron Curtain may seem counterintuitive to Americans today…” Washington Post

Yelena Demikovsky (Producer/Director)

Founder of Red Palette Pictures, New York, Yelena was born in Russia but has lived in the USA since the early 1990s. She is an award-winning  documentary and narrative filmmaker with a broad theatre background. She taught theater acting and directing ay Moscow Theatre Academy. Her award-winning documentaries include: The Story Of Fenist, Happy To Be So, and Vera. An Intimate Sketch.

DISTRIBUTION                                               

Black Russians: The Red Experience is will be a feature-length documentary. There will be a theatrical release followed by distribution to television, cable, and satellite networks worldwide.