Directors Daniel Scheinert, left, and Daniel Kwan pose together at the 76th DGA Awards at the Beverly Hilton, Saturday, Feb. 10, 2024, in Beverly Hills, Calif. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello) ORG XMIT: CACP638
Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry at the Jefferson Chamber annual meeting at the Alario Center in Westwego on Tuesday, February 6, 2024. (Photo by Chris Granger, The Times-Picayune)
Directors Daniel Scheinert, left, and Daniel Kwan pose together at the 76th DGA Awards at the Beverly Hilton, Saturday, Feb. 10, 2024, in Beverly Hills, Calif. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello) ORG XMIT: CACP638
More than 100 TV and film industry workers, including several Academy Award nominees and winners, urged the Louisiana Legislature in a letter Friday to reject a bill that would add electrocution and nitrogen gas to the approved methods for executing prisoners.
The letter from 116 film industry workers suggests that many would flee “Hollywood South,” foregoing Louisiana’s picturesque landscape and film tax credits, should the state expand its methods of killing.
“How can we, in good conscience, continue to conduct business within a state that contemplates the implementation of execution methods reminiscent of history’s gravest atrocities?” the letter reads.
Among those signing it were Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert, the filmmaking duo behind “Everything Everywhere All At Once,” which cleaned up at the 2023 Oscars; Oscar-winning composer T-Bone Burnett, and a host of directors and producers of locally shot productions including “Beasts of the Southern Wild,” “Causeway,” “Jurassic World” and HBO’s “True Detective.” The list includes several local filmmakers.
Gov. Jeff Landry’s office did not respond to a request for comment Friday.
But Lt. Gov. Billy Nungesser, who oversees culture, recreation and tourism, said he hopes filmmakers considering leaving Louisiana will exercise restraint.
“I hope they don’t do that,” Nungesser said through a spokesperson. “It’s only going to hurt the hard-working people in the film industry.”
Landry, a proponent of capital punishment in a state that conducted its last execution 14 years ago, has called a special session for next week on crime. Methods of execution are on the table, after Alabama last month became the first state to kill using nitrogen gas, and the governor is expected to push lawmakers to approve more.
A proposed bill, HB 6, from Rep. Nicholas Muscarello, R-Hammond, would add electrocution and nitrogen gas as legal methods in Louisiana. The bill also would shield from public scrutiny the manufacturers of lethal injection drugs and the state’s procurement of them.
If the bill passes, Louisiana would join three states — Alabama, Mississippi and Oklahoma — to approve execution by nitrogen gas.
Other states have also approved new execution methods in recent years, including firing squads, as corrections officials seek to surmount a shortage of lethal injection drugs.
According to an Associated Press report on Alabama’s recent execution using nitrogen gas, Kenneth Eugene Smith “shook in thrashing spasms and seizure-like movements for several minutes at the start of the execution. The force of his movements caused the gurney to visibly move at least once.”
Louisiana Governor Jeff Landry at the Jefferson Chamber annual meeting at the Alario Center in Westwego on Tuesday, February 6, 2024. (Photo by Chris Granger, The Times-Picayune)
The letter from Hollywood South filmmakers, actors and crew was sent Friday to House speaker Phillip DeVillier’s office, advocates said.
It expresses “surprise and concern that the state is considering restarting executions by going back to cruel methods of the past. … These kinds of methods harken back to dark periods in history, and are not in line with the modern Louisiana that we have come to know.”
The film industry has flocked to Louisiana in the past two decades, drawn in part by a generous tax credit program. In 2015, before state lawmakers reined in the program by instituting a monetary cap, motion pictures added $2.7 billion to the state’s economy, a federal report found.
As state attorney general for eight years, Landry pushed to expand available execution methods. He has also pushed for more secrecy around carrying out the death penalty, advocating in 2018 for a change in state law that would let the state keep private which pharmacies or drug companies supply lethal injection drugs.
The letter from filmmakers is part of a wider push by death penalty opponents to enlist celebrity, business and civic leaders to highlight the potential economic consequences for resuming executions in Louisiana and expanding the methods of killing.
British billionaire Richard Branson, who a few years ago launched a campaign to abolish the death penalty, also weighed in on the eve of the special session.
“We love doing business in Louisiana. And we want to help build communities where people feel safe, supported, and where everyone can thrive. That’s why I’m so concerned to see proposals to restart executions in the state,” Branson said in a statement.
The argument that executing people by electrocution or nitrogen gas is bad for Louisiana’s business climate was echoed Friday by several advocates.
“We don’t need to reinstate gas chambers and the electric chair, all while cloaking our death penalty in unparalleled levels of state secrecy,” King Alexander, president of the Louisiana Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, wrote in a statement.
“States that have done away with the death penalty are reaping economic benefits while those bringing back outdated capital punishment methods are being embarrassed in the national and international press.”
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Hollywood filmmakers to protest new Louisiana execution methods pushed by Jeff Landry – NOLA.com
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