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Amanda McBaine and Jesse Moss are co-directors of the newly released documentary, Boys State, which premiered at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival and was awarded the Grand Jury Prize. The film, which is now streaming on Apple TV+, is a political coming-of-age story, examining the health of American democracy through an unusual experiment: a thousand 17-year-old boys from across the state of Texas gather together to build a representative government from the ground up. High-minded ideals collide with low-down dirty tricks as four boys of diverse backgrounds and political views navigate the challenges of organizing political parties, shaping consensus, and campaigning for the highest office at Texas Boys State—governor.
In this episode, Jesse, Amanda and I discuss how they came up with the idea to make a documentary about Texas Boys State, the unique challenges of filming a feature length doc in the course of one week, and why a verité documentary like this is such an effective tool for holding a mirror up to our political system and divided country.
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