Film on Interracial Marriage That Broke Down Barriers Screens in Sag Harbor

Ahead of the sixth annual Hamptons Take 2 Documentary Film Festival, scheduled for Dec. 6 to 8, "The Loving Story," an award-winning documentary will be shown at Bay Street Theatre in Sag Harbor on Sunday.

The film is about a mixed racial couple, Richard Loving and Mildred Jeter, who were married in Washington D.C. in 1958 and returned to their home state of Virginia, where they were arrested because their marriage was illegal at the time. Loving is a white and Jeter is African-American and Cherokee Native American.

Their case ultimately went before the Supreme Court, and in 1967 they ruled that “under the Constitution, the freedom to marry or not to marry a person of another race resides with the individual and cannot be infringed by the state.”

The decision abolished anti-miscegenation laws.

Jacqui Lofaro, the film festival's executive director, said, “The story of the Lovings, the interracial couple in the film who fight for the legal recognition of their love, is a powerful and timely story, as challenges to marriage equality continue in this country and around the world.”

Directed by Nancy Buirski, “The Loving Story” received several awards, including the American Historical Association’s John E. O’Connor Film Award in January 2013; the George Foster Peabody Award in May 2013; and has been nominated for three Emmy Awards, for Best Documentary, Outstanding Historical Programming, and Outstanding Editing, in the 34th annual News and Documentary Emmy Awards, which will be presented on Oct. 1.

After the screening, a panel discussion will be held with co-producer Patti Romeu and Martha Hodes, a film consultant and New York University history professor.

The screening starts at 4 p.m. Tickets are $15 at the door.