10 Days in Watts
(2023)

Director’s Statement:

During the filming of another PBS project, Emmy-nominated LA FOODWAYS, a one-hour film and 6-part series about the history of farming-to-food scarcity in Los Angeles, I met a remarkable man named Tim Watkins.

Tim Watkins is the President of the Watts Labor Community Action Committee (WLCAC), a community-based organization in Watts, one that his father Ted Watkins had founded almost 60 years earlier. The WLCAC is the epitome of an engaged community-based organization, with resources and projects to help this economically challenged neighborhood in a multitude of ways– from housing to food distribution, family planning, to gang mediation.

I was very taken by Tim and Ted, their father-son story, as well as a multigenerational commitment to helping the people of Watts. Tim had carried forward his father’s founding mission, “To improve the quality of life for the residents of Watts and the surrounding neighborhoods.” For decades the WLCAC has been a pillar of strength, a lifeline, within the most densely populated, most underserved neighborhood in Los Angeles County, Watts.

Tim embraced our idea of telling a story about his family, about the members of the community, but also the completion of a twelve-year project, the opening of Mud Town Farms. This is a two-and-a-half-acre farm right at the foot of one of the most notorious housing projects in Watts, Jordan Downs. It’s a much-needed green space in Watts, but also a way to help feed the community who had little or no access to fresh fruit and vegetables.

My idea was to do no sit-down interviews, to shoot it over only a few weeks, and use the opening of MudTown Farms as the center piece of the story. I had spent a lot of time meeting people from the community, going to events and Town Halls, and speaking to the staff and volunteers at the WLCAC over the two years prior.

I started the process by doing thirty-seven audio only interviews. I wanted to hear their stories and in an emotional way, feel their journeys, as opposed to being told about them. It was a way to also allow the neighborhood to literally speak for itself, with its own voice.
The residents of Watts were extraordinary people, the stories were moving, and they also had a lot to say. In each case, what they revealed was that they had learned to live within complex circumstances, and had then taken those experiences, along with a genuine sense of purpose, to dedicate themselves to extending that knowledge to others. These were proud and determined residents, living lives of service, repeatedly expressing their passion for their neighborhood. They called it, “Watts Pride.” But they also shared with me a powerful and moving acronym for Watts: “We Are Taught To Survive.”

The more time I spent hearing their stories, the more impassioned I was to let them tell it.

We gathered our crew with a myriad of backgrounds: Our extraordinary DP, Felipe Vara De Ray, was from Spain. Our sound man was African American from the Caribbean. Our producer was a Palestinian woman, my other producers were also women. Our composer was African American and grew up near the WLCAC in South Central and all our PA’s grew up in the community. I was aware that a white man, telling a story like this is unusual. At a certain point before I began, I had struggled with that. But, when I approached Mr. Watkins to share my concern, he made it clear that he wanted me to do this. He felt strongly that I was the person to tell it, and he told me “Hey! There are Black filmmakers in this neighborhood who know this story, but they aren’t banging on my door. You are banging on my door. I want you to do this.”

Tim’s love for his father, a drive to find unique solutions to problems that they face, and then the community’s passion to help one another under the most complex circumstances, moved me deeply.

That is what inspired this series.