LINDY BOGGS: STEEL AND VELVET TELLS THE STORY OF THE FORMER CONGRESSWOMAN AND AMBASSADOR TO THE VATICAN

          By any standard, former Louisiana Congresswoman and Ambassador to the Vatican, Corinne Claiborne “Lindy” Boggs has had a remarkable life.   Her life and career are the subject of a new documentary called Lindy Boggs: Steel and Velvet.  The one-hour documentary is a co-production of Bess Carrick, director of Blackbird Films in New Orleans and Louisiana Public Broadcasting, the state public television network for Louisiana.

The wife of former House Majority Leader Hale Boggs and mother of three, Lindy Boggs took over the seat in Congress after her husband was presumed deceased when the small plane he was traveling in over the mountains of Alaska in 1972 disappeared and was never found.  After winning a special election to fill the seat, the Pointe Coupee Parish, Louisiana native became the first woman to ever be elected to Congress from Louisiana. She went on to serve nine terms in Congress with seats on the powerful House Appropriations Committee and the Select Committee on Children, Youth and Families.  During her tenure, Mrs. Boggs spearheaded legislation on everything from civil rights to equal pay for women and helped found the Women’s Congressional Caucus.  Mrs. Boggs still holds the distinction of being the only women with a room named for her at the U.S. Capitol Building.

Her tenaciousness in getting legislation through Congress was legendary as she persistently applied pressure on legislators until she got what she wanted.  Former Louisiana Senator J. Bennett Johnson likened dealing with Mrs. Boggs to the Chinese Water Torture because of her persistent, persuasive and effective methods.

While in Congress, she also had the honor of being the first women to chair the Democratic National Convention and to serve as a Regent on the Smithsonian Board.   Mrs. Boggs was also selected to preside over the Bicentennial of American Constitution in 1987 and the commission commemorating the 200th anniversary of Congress.

After ending her congressional career, the devout Catholic accepted President Bill Clinton’s offer to serve as U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See in Vatican City.  She served in that post from 1997-2001.
 
The political legacy of the Boggs family has continued to grow over the years.  Daughter Cokie Roberts and her husband Steve Roberts write a syndicated newspaper political column and Cokie is a Washington Correspondent for National Public Radio and ABC.  Thomas Hale Boggs, Jr. is a successful Washington attorney and lobbyist while the late Barbara Boggs Sigmund was mayor of Princeton, New Jersey before succumbing to cancer in 1990.  Cokie’s daughter and Lindy’s granddaughter Rebecca Roberts is the narrator for the documentary.

Rebecca Roberts hosts a daily local talk show “The Intersection” on WETA radio in the Washington, DC market. She was for four years the technology correspondent for “The World,” a co-production of the BBC, PRI and WGBH. Roberts hosted the Emmy-nominated public television program “Springboard” produced by KQED-TV in San Francisco. Roberts has a bachelor’s degree in politics from Princeton University and lives in Bethesda, Maryland with her husband and three children.

Lindy Boggs: Steel and Velvet producer Bess Carrick is best known for producing and co-directing Backlash: Race and the American Dream, a look at David Duke’s run for the U.S. Senate and the white backlash movement it spawned. She has also worked with Emmy Award winner Bill Moyers, Discover Channel, National Geographic Channel and many others on television projects. Since hurricane Katrina she has worked on numerous film projects about the storm set
for international and national network distribution. Carrick lives in New Orleans and owns the Forest Retreat, near Natchez, Mississippi.

Editor Dawn Logsdon has been editing documentaries for 15 years. Her work includes the Oscar-nominated The Weather Underground and the Sundance Festival-winning documentary Paragraph 175. Mike Esneault, who scored LPB’s award-winning six-part series Louisiana: A History, provided the score for the documentary. He has also collaborated with Terence Blanchard on scores for a number of director Spike Lee’s movies.

Website for Lindy Boggs: Steel and Velvet
http://www.lpb.org/lindyboggs/

Producer/ Director
Bess Carrick 504-866-2226
Email: blackbrd7@earthlink.net

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