Sold-out Birmingham screening spotlights As Goes the South documentary

A sold-out screening of As Goes the South turned the Negro Southern League Museum into more than a movie stop. In Birmingham, the documentary was set up as a community conversation about the city’s progress and its effect on families and children, giving local film watchers a rare civic pairing of place, story and audience in one room.

Crystal Mullen-Johnson organized the event, which was listed for Wednesday, June 17, 2026, from 5:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. at the museum in Birmingham. The program was built less like a standard museum screening and more like a compact forum, with a meet-and-greet from 5:00 p.m. to 5:45 p.m., small bites from Michaels, a welcome from 6:00 p.m. to 6:15 p.m., an introduction of Ed Fields and the team from 6:15 p.m. to 6:30 p.m., the film from 6:30 p.m. to 7:15 p.m., and post-film conversations from 7:15 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.

That structure is what made the event stand out for Alabama independent film readers. The screening was not just a seated showing, but a guided local gathering with room for introductions, networking and discussion after the lights came up. For filmmakers, community organizers and civic partners, that kind of format matters: it turns a documentary into a tool for meeting people, building relationships and framing a conversation around Birmingham itself.

The film’s own materials pushed that idea even further. As Goes the South presents Birmingham in 4K color and rejects the idea that the city should be seen only through old trauma or black-and-white stereotypes. The team credits show a local production network behind it, with Noel Didla and Ed Fields as executive producers, Brian B+ Cross and Eric Coleman as director-producers, and Dez Wilson handling cinematography and marketing.

The sold-out status suggested the film had already found an audience beyond a routine one-night screening. In a city where place-based projects often compete for attention, As Goes the South arrived with a built-in community frame: a Birmingham story, made by a Birmingham-connected team, shown in a Birmingham museum, with conversation attached. That is the kind of screening that can help a documentary travel farther than the runtime on the screen.