‘Lincoln Is Crying’ movie takes a comedic look at the corruption that stains Illinois ... and Chicago

John Davies has been a television producer for most of his adult life, Tom Weinberg too. They met decades ago at WTTW-Ch. 11 and have fashioned separate careers making films about, well, almost everything. They will be together Wednesday for a theatrical screening of “Lincoln Is Crying: The Grifters, Grafters and Governors of Illinois.”

This is a film produced by Davies (along with Brian Kallies and David Truitt). The evening will include a conversation moderated by former TV newsman Mike Flannery, featuring Davies, Weinberg, Phil Ponce and political consultant Delmarie Cobb. Special guest is actor and writer Tim Kazurinsky, who appears in the film.

My colleague Michael Phillips didn’t much care for the film when he first saw it but others have, with the Daily Southtown calling it an “entertaining take on the state’s history of systemic political corruption” and it has been especially entertaining for people who lack first-hand experience with the dirty political deeds of the local scene.

“When people from other states see this film they are shocked,” says Davies. “The idea came to me over the years. Look, I am not a serious news producer so with some advice from people at The Second City, we decided to take a humorous look at corruption. Yes, it is a serious matter and there are many places and sources where that can be explored.”

The movie features the particulars of the crimes of such governors as Otto Kerner, Dan Walker, George Ryan and, with the most time of the 85-minute film devoted to him, Rod Blagojevich. There’s a smattering of aldermen and others. Many smart observers are here to comment, including the Tribune’s Rick Pearson and Jeff Coen, TV’s Andy Shaw and Walter Jacobson, former alderman and writer Dick Simpson, historian Richard Lindberg, and on and on.

Weinberg lauds its use of archival footage. You can, of course, judge for yourself. “We did not set out to make a show like (PBS’ acclaimed investigative series) ‘Frontline,’” says Davies. “There are many ways to tell a story. The movie is a comedy. It is not as depressing as it sounds.”

Weinberg nods hearing that. Few people have seen more TV, and more ways to make it work, and not work. He is a child of the north suburbs who explains, “We had the first television on the block. It was 1947 and that medium dominated and guided my life from those days forward.”

He would become a pioneering videographer, pointing his camera at such local heroes as Minnie Miñoso, Bill Veeck and Studs Terkel. He would provide a platform for others drawn to film and documentary by creating the PBS programs, “Image Union” and “The ‘90s,” which nurtured and inspired. He is also an author (“Chasing the Lost City: Chronicles of Discovery in Honduras”) and teacher.

And what may be his most enduring legacy is Media Burn, a video archive that he founded in 2003. It is a repository of more than 10,000 videos, many of them captivating. “They are of a time when people did not know there was ‘television behavior,’ no media coaches, so there is a rawness and honesty,” says Weinberg.

As a teenager in Wheaton, Davies came under TV’s spell early too, but with an emphasis on entertainment. He performed and made short films with high school classmate Jim Belushi; he attended Michigan’s Kalamazoo College and eventually came to WTTW-Ch. 11 as a member of its documentary film crew, working with Weinberg and John Callaway. He also worked with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert; cocreated, executive produced and directed “Wild Chicago”; gave us an NBC special, “A Comedy Salute to Andy Kaufman” and such programs as “A Comedy Salute to Michael Jordan,” “Jonathan Brandmeier from Chicago” and “Phunny Business: A Black Comedy,” a stunning documentary about Chicago’s first Black-owned comedy club.

He has been splitting his time between Chicago (where he has always kept an apartment) and Los Angeles for more than 30 years. He says, “Tom (Weinberg) was the executive producer of ‘Image Union’ when I started at WTTW in 1978 as a union grip/camera assistant. He was instrumental in airing my early independent films and providing me with access to cameras and editing to help me cross over to the producing side of WTTW. He supported my efforts. I owe him.”

Davies, always full of ideas and activities, tells of how some of his very early work has found its way into the hands of acclaimed director Quentin Tarantino, about his possible involvement in a new program about Black comedy clubs and how he carries on with a project about Johnny Carson that was sparked by his friendship with the late writer Bill Zehme.

The conversation returned to “Lincoln is Crying,” and Weinberg asked if we remembered what Studs Terkel once said about local politics and then he reminded us, saying, “Chicago is not the most corrupt of cities. Chicago, though, is the Big Daddy. Not more corrupt, just more theatrical, more colorful in its shadiness.”

No kidding.

“Lincoln is Crying” screening event is 6 p.m. at the Film Row Cinema at Columbia College, 1104 S. Wabash Ave. 8th Floor; tickets $15-$20 at lincolniscrying.com

rkogan@chicagotribune.com