More than 300 people attended a premiere of a new “48 hours” feature-length documentary, “The Whole Gritty City,” at the Leonard Nimoy Theater in NYC on Thursday night. The film, which is by “48 Hours” editor-producer Richard Barber and photojournalist Andre Lambertson, follows three New Orleans marching bands as they prepare to march in Mardi Gras parades.
Several “48 Hours” staffers attended the event, including correspondent Susan Spencer and senior producers Peter Schweitzer, Anthony Batson and Judy Tygard. In a speech at the premiere, senior executive producer Susan Zirinsky said the film, which will air on CBS at 9pmET on February 15, was both heartbreaking and inspirational.
“Thank you guys from the bottom of my heart for just getting us here,” Wilbert Rawlins Jr., the band director at Landry Walker High School, said to Barber and Lambertson in his remarks. “For a lot of children, the band is their lifeline.”