Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin will be shown Saturday, Feb. 21 at the University of Chicago Campus, 1-5 p.m., followed by a reception, panel discussion and break-out discussion groups. All at Ida Noyes Hall, 1212 E. 59th St., $12 ($5 for students). Contact Joan Spoerl (773) 549-4151.
This award-winning documentary film about Bayard Rustin, an almost forgotten civil-rights leader credited with organizing Dr. Martin Luther King’s March on Washington in 1963 along with many other leadership roles, is sponsored by University of Chicago Alumni, Faculty members and student groups, as well as the Chicago Human Relations Foundation.
The film has won eight awards for Best Documentary in film festivals around the nation and Europe and was an Official Selection in the 2003 National Black Arts Festival, the 2003 Amnesty International Human Rights Film Festival and the 2003 Sundance Film Festival.
Bayard Rustin’s activism in seeking and demonstrating for racial equality, economic justice and peace is portrayed in this hour-long film as complicated by denials of leadership positions he suffered because he was an openly gay man in a fiercely homophobic era. He was imprisoned, beaten, threatened and fired.
Two of the filmmakers, Nancy Kates and Bennett Singer and alumnus Adam Green, professor of history at of NYU, and others will lead discussion groups.
See www.rustin.org.