Summer Night Cinema: "Wattstax"

This documentary captures an all-day concert at the 1972 Watts Summer Festival with performances by Stax Records artists including Isaac Hayes, Rufus Thomas, and The Staples Singers.

Featuring highlights of a seven-hour concert for an audience of over 100,000 people at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum in the summer of 1972, along with on-the-street interviews and comedian Richard Pryor at his peak, this amazing documentary film celebrates a mammoth musical event, the seventh annual Watts Summer Festival. Performers include Isaac Hayes, The Dramatics, Luther Ingram, The Staple Singers, Rufus Thomas, The Emotions, Albert King, and many more.

(1973, dir. Mel Stuart, color, 103 min.)