Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1470106
Courthouse and Trial Another incredible part of the location base was filming the trial scenes in the Tallahatchie ounty Courthouse in Sumner, MS, the actual courthouse where the Till murder trial took place in 1955. The courtroom had been restored to historical accuracy in 2015. The Art and prop departments studied photographs to ensure that other period details were still included, such as dressing in the jurors' hats and jackets on the existing clothes hooks, and providing a card table for the Black journalists and activists that were in attendance. For the jury deliberation scene, the crew built a swing set inside of the courtroom, removing pews and using the existing windows because the renovated room had been made smaller and would not accommodate cast and camera comfortably. For the town square which surrounded the courthouse, the Art Department had to address each façade with new graphics. Again here, we used old news footage and photographs to capture the look and feel of the businesses that surrounded the courthouse. Most of the more featured signage was hand-painted, as we wanted to use Casey as frequently as we could for his experience and talent. We converted the Emmett Till Interpretive Center building façade and front room, also located in the town square, into a diner. Further into their space, we used an oce and bullpen as the interior of Chicago's NAACP. There were other buildings in the square that were a part of the story that the production had the privilege of shooting in. For example, we shot the scene of arolyn Bryant giving her first witness account to the defense attorney in the same building where that moment actually happened. We also filmed the scenes where the murderers were interviewed for their confession of the crime for Look Magazine in the same building. The weight of these scenes, which were all so important to the story, were elevated by the closeness to the locations in which they were filmed. A B C A. TALLAHATCHIE COUNTY COURTHOUSE EXTERIOR. SET PHOTO. B. NEWSSTAND WITH GRAPHICS BY KERRI MAHONEY. SET PHOTO. C. TALLAHATCHIE COUNTY COURTHOUSE INTERIOR. PRODUCTION STILL. D. PHARMACY EXTERIOR. LOCATION SET PHOTO. E. PHARMACY INTERIOR. LOCATION SET PHOTO. F. CAFE EXTERIOR. PRODUCTION STILL. G. MAMIE'S HARLEM SPEECH. PRODUCTION STILL. H. EMMETT TILL'S FUNERAL. SET PHOTO BY J. VAN EVERS/ABC.