Projects

DOCUMENTARIES

CURRENT DOCUMENTARY FILM: SMOKE AND MIRROR: How Barbecue Reflects America.

Working with a team that includes The Louisiana Weekly, which is fast approaching its 100th year as New Orleans’ leading African-American newspaper, HWN explores what The New Yorker calls “America’s most political food.” We begin in NOLA but quickly find ourselves in North Carolina, where “barbecue” is a noun and airport shops sell t-shirts with regional maps simply labeled “vinegar, tomato, mustard.” In NC, they call themselves the “cradle of Q,” but in NOLA we wonder if Congo Square, birthplace of jazz, is actually the birthplace. Plus, that whole cultural appropriation issue. You’ll never see barbecue in quite the same way again.

Principal photography began with the North Carolina Barbecue Society and includes locations in Texas and New Orleans.

Some relevant background:

Curtis earned his first producer credit with Wayne Ewing Films' 2007 release, “The Outsiders of New Orleans: Loudon Press.” The documentary told the story of NOLA icon Gypsy Lou Webb and the Loujon Press that pioneered the independent magazine movement of the 1960s and helped produce Charles Bukowski’s first book. Fans of Buk will note that several poems mention the Webb family and the New Orleans production.
 
Also worth noting, documentary film-wise: Again with Wayne Ewing Films, Curtis appears in the documentary series “Rum Dairy Back-Story” about how Hunter Thompson’s “long lost novel” became a Johnny Depp film. To take the series from virtual to reality, HWN helped produced a video gallery at the iconic Clock Tower venue in Manhattan.

Website collaboration:

NATIONAL COURTS MONITOR

As the granddaughter of Tommy “The Cork” Corcoran, the LBJ aide who literally helped write the New Deal, Sara Corcoran Warner hails from one of America’s high-profile legal families. As California slashed court budgets in 2011,, she became active in letting people know what that means for families facing life-changing civil litigation – like housing evictions, traffic tickets that lead to jail time and the horrible expense of the system. Based on the success in California, Sara moved to Washington where she continues to write for the National Courts Monitor website and other outlets like CityWatch LA and BuzzFeed. HWN is proud to provide editing and production for Sara and her contributors.

WEHOVILLE – THE WEST HOLLYWOOD NEWS

Hank Scott’s legendary journalism and media creation career has ranged from from free daily newspapers to helping launch the first New York Times website. His most recent victory came in West Hollywood and the muck-racking investigative website WehoVille.com. He has recently moved back to NYC to re-set his media activities.

Non-profit Investigative Journalism

ASPEN JOURNALISM

The non-profit news organization has become a go-to source for Colorado water and environmental journalism. Curtis is a founding member of the group’s editorial advisory board and was honored to also become a founding member of its Publisher’s Circle.