Deadline’s Doc Talk Podcast: Why John Ridley Calls Oscar Contender ‘King Coal’ A “Phenomenal Documentary”

Matthew Carey
·2 min read

In a sense, Central Appalachia is as threatened by climate change as much as any other place on Earth.

Since the 1970s alone, 2 billion tons of coal have been extracted from the region, providing fuel for a highly industrialized nation and jobs for thousands in West Virginia, eastern Kentucky and surrounding areas. But as the single biggest contributor to rising global temperatures, the energy source is being phased out, and with it an entire way of life.

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The impact of coal on Central Appalachia – the economy, the people, the culture – is explored in King Coal, directed by Elaine McMillion Sheldon, a native of the region. She appears on the latest edition of Deadline’s Doc Talk podcast to discuss her feature documentary, winner of awards at film festivals across the country. The film is produced by McMillion Sheldon, Peggy Drexler, and Shane Boris and Diane Becker, two of the Oscar-winning producers of Navalny.

King Coal is a poetic but unsentimental examination of the way the combustible black substance has come to dominate Appalachia. To cite one small but telling example, players on the Mingo Central High School football squad in Delbarton, WV (team name: the Miners) lay hands on a big chunk of coal as they take the field for each game. The school, which has a miner’s pickaxe in its logo, is located on King Coal Highway.

Doc Talk co-host John Ridley, the Oscar-winning screenwriter of 12 Years a Slave, says of King Coal, “Probably not since seeing Faya Dayi have I been so moved emotionally by a documentary, just in the visuals … in the construction.” He calls the film “phenomenal.”

Check out our conversation with McMillion Sheldon on the new episode of Doc Talk, hosted by Ridley and Deadline’s Documentary Editor Matt Carey. The podcast is a production of Deadline and Ridley’s Nō Studios, and presented with support from National Geographic Documentary Films.

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