RED FATHER
Date: Monday, November 17th
Time: 6:00-8:00p.m.
Location: 55 Lexington Avenue, Engelman Theater
The Sandra Kahn Wasserman Jewish Studies Center at Baruch College cordially invites you to join them on November 17th, 2014, for a special film screening of Red Father, a documentary by Tova Beck-Friedman. A discussion panel will follow the film.
Thought-provoking and nuanced, Tova Beck-Friedman’s documentary Red Father offers a fascinating look at a politically turbulent era, and offers the viewer a close look at the legacy of a father’s impact on his family. In the documentary, “Red Diaper Baby”, Janet Ades scrutinizes her father’s Communist legacy. She admires the father who confronted legal racism, fought fascism in Spain and was repeatedly blacklisted. Nonetheless, she does not spare her criticism of the Communist Party’s conduct.
“Red Father” centers on the life and work of Bernard Ades who as a young lawyer in the 1930s worked for the International Labor Defense of the Communist party and gained notoriety defending African Americans in capital cases. The case that brought him the most publicity was that of Ewel Lee in which Ades fought an all-white judicial system in Maryland. The result of the case expanded the definition of “jury of peers” to include African American men in jury pools.
Guest speakers at this event will include:
- Janet Naava Ades Esq. – Daughter of Bernard Ades, the Baltimore-based civil rights attorney and communist party member whose life and deeds serve as the focal point of the film.
- Maria Mitchell Esq. – Legal expert and Assistant HC Public Defender at Hennepin County Public Defender in Minnesota.
- Joseph Moore – Maryland-based Attorney, Prosecutor, and Author.
- George Rappoport – Wagner College historian and professor emeritus.
- Tova Beck-Friedman – Film’s director
Admission is free but please reserve your seat for the event by emailing [email protected]
