On July 1st, the night of the P.O.V. broadcast, Producer Maggie Bowman had a great interview with Phil Ponce on WTTW Chicago Tonight.

Maggie mostly focuses on the Chicago section of Election Day, but she also speaks about the most powerful moments of the film for her and what the film reveals about the state of the polls in America.

Watch the ten minute clip here.

This morning, director Katy Chevigny had a great interview on NPR's The Takeaway program. She talks about the P.O.V. Election Day broadcast and the 2008 election challenges ahead.

Listen to the interview here.

P.O.V. just launched an incredible website for Election Day.

Visit the site to watch additional video from the film, learn more about voting procedures and recourses in an informative Election FAQ, and find out how experts would improve the American election system. After the broadcast tomorrow, don't forget to share your reactions to the film in the "Talking Back" section.

Election Day will have its national broadcast premiere this summer as part of the award-winning PBS series P.O.V. The film will air on Tuesday, July 1, 2008 at 10 p.m. (check your local listings).

Celebrating its 21st season on PBS in 2008, the award-winning P.O.V. series is the longest-running showcase on television to feature the work of America's best contemporary-issue independent filmmakers. Airing Tuesdays at 10 p.m., June through September, with primetime specials during the year, P.O.V. has brought more than 250 award-winning documentaries to millions nationwide, and now has a Webby Award-winning online series, P.O.V.'s Borders. Since 1988, P.O.V. has pioneered the art of presentation and outreach using independent nonfiction media to build new communities in conversation about today's most pressing social issues. The Arts Engine team is proud that Election Day will make its broadcast debut on such a compelling series. More information about P.O.V is available online at www.pbs.org/pov.

On Sunday, the Times reported activities around a new reading of the Alabama constitution, which will grant thousands of former felons in Alabama the right to vote.

Read the article here

It seems that the constitution, previously thought to ban all felons from voting, actually only disenfranchises those who have committed a felony involving "moral turpitude." Drug possession felonies, among others, would fall outside that classification.

The most incredible quote in the article came from Marty Connors, the chairman of the state Republican Party, who had this to say in reference to a previous piece of state legislation that would affect the voting rights of all ex-felons in Alabama, regardless of moral turpitude:

"There's no more anti-Republican bill than this. As frank as I can be, we're opposed to it because felons don't tend to vote Republican."

The quote reveals the biggest obstacle to any type of electoral reform in the U.S.: political leaders from both major parties only support reform to the extent that it further enfranchises their own constituencies. It's just rare that a politician will admit to this so directly.

After attending the Washington DC screening of Election Day, Al Jazeera asked director Katy Chevigny to participate in a live interview about the film on their show "Min Washington" ("From Washington"). Katy was told she would be interviewed in Arabic with simultaneous translations through an ear piece. Only once she was live on the air and being broadcast to millions of people throughout the Arab world did Katy realize that the promised simultaneous translation was NOT coming through the ear piece. So she guessed at the questions as best she could. See her reactions here:

The Chicago Premiere of Election Day kicked off with a screening at Roberto Clemente High School. Sixty high-school juniors watched Election Day as part of their Contemporary American History class, taught by Dan Moses. The students, some of whom will be voting and acting as election judges in this year's primary, had lots of questions for director Katy Chevigny and producer Maggie Bowman. They were especially interested in felon disenfranchisement and debated whether voting is a citizen's privilege or right. "We just finished a unit studying America's role in protecting democracy around the U.S. and we're going to use the film to explore democracy in action in our own country," said Moses.

On both Friday and Monday nights the film was screened to great crowds that included many local friends and members of Maggie's family at the Gene Siskel Film Center, which has one of the most beautiful projections we had seen the film on to date-rivaled only by Lincoln Center's Walter Reade Theatre. Along with Katy and Maggie, the audience was also able to talk with Chicago poll watcher extraordinaire from the film, Jim Fuchs, who fielded questions about local election regulations. Katy and Maggie were also interviewed on Eight Forty-Eight on WBEZ , the Spike O'Dell show on WGN Radio, and the Roe Conn show on WLS.

Katy and Maggie with producer's rep and publicist John Iltis
(l) and Maggie's brother Peter Bowman (r)

Check out the 3 Star review of Election Day in the Chicago Tribune, in which Tribune art critic Sid Smith praises Election Day for offering a "glimpse into everyday life during one of our quadrennial watersheds."

Producer Maggie Bowman weighs in with a Free Press Blog Post about the importance of independent media.

On January 29, 2008 Election Day was shown as part of the Tribeca Youth Screening Series. Nearly one-hundred local students ranging from middle to high school screened the film at Tribeca Cinemas and enjoyed a Q&A with director Katy Chevigny, who was asked questions such as 'How long does it take to make a movie?' and 'Who did you want to win the election?' The students also participated in a mock election, in which Barack Obama won a landslide victory.

Director Katy Chevigny and Producer Maggie Bowman made their way down to the St. Louis International Film Festival for a Sunday afternoon screening of Election Day. On the Monday after the festival screening the film was screened for a local high school. Great audiences attended both. The crowd found the specific problems of their hometown of St. Louis to be especially maddening. Multiple questions were asked about computerized voting and why that has not become more prevalent. Scott Granneman, who was in attendance, has offered us a few articles to peruse on why computerized voting has a long way to go:

"The Problem With Electronic Voting" by Bruce Schneier

"My Supplemental E-Voting Testimonial" by Ed Felten

From Scott Granneman's blog

We finally got around to posting a few pics from our premiere and party down at SXSW. We had a big house for our screening at the Austin Convention Center on Saturday, March 11, 2007. The following day we had an awesome concert at Rutamaya Cafe with friends of the late Blaze Foley (writer/singer of the "Election Day" song) performing Blaze's songs. Blaze lived in Austin for many years and it was really special to share our premiere with his friends and family, including his sister Marsha who came to town for the screening and party.

Maggie Bowman and Jenny Pellerito go over ticket lists before doors open.

Viewers line up outside the convention center auditorium.

The SXSW audience

Katy Chevigny takes questions after the film.

David Becker and Rico Cullen

Maggie introduces the band at Rutamaya

Beth Davenport

Katy warms up the crowd at Rutamaya

Angela Tucker talks to the audience about taking action on election reform.

The band: Beth Galiger, Art Blondin, Mandy Mercier, Jon Emery, and Boomer Norman

Dallas Brennan Rexer takes over bartending duties

Jennifer Gallardo, Angela Tucker, and Monjay Settro with a bottle of Tito's Vodka, our party sponsor

Yesterday Katy and Maggie launched a blog on the Huffington Post. We'll be writing posts on a somewhat regular basis about election reform in the months leading up to our PBS broadcast in 2008.

We timed this inaugural post around our New York premiere at the Human Rights Watch International Film Festival, which is tonight! Tonight's screening is sold out, but there are still tickets available for tomorrow, June 28, 2007, at 9:00 p.m.--the closing night of the festival. We're thrilled to be showing the film for all of our New York friends and family. And we're very excited that Leon Batts, who is featured in the film voting for the first time in his life, will be joining us at the screenings.

We just got back from a great weekend in Toronto at Hot Docs for the Canadian premiere of Election Day. The festival is impressive on many levels, not the least of which being the dedicated public that turns out to see the films. It is very well-publicized and is free to seniors and students for the matinees. We met a couple of women in their seventies who said they had been going to films all week long and were just loving it.

We had really good sized crowds for both of the screenings. Most of each audience stuck around for the Q&A and asked great questions. One guy said the line that summed up the film for him was when Jim Fuchs, the Republican pollwatcher in Chicago, had trouble casting his ballot and asked "Is there some kind of trick involved?" Others were quite curious about the felon disenfranchisement issue, which they had not known about before seeing the film. It was the first international screening we had been present for (we didn't make it down to the Buenos Aires Film Festival) and it was interesting to hear a non-American perspective on all of the voting issues. While Americans have responded to the film with what seems to be a laughter of recognition, the Canadian laughter was more along the lines of "can it really be this bad?"

"Election Dayis unique largely because it's not about politics so much as the act of voting and what voting means to people of various walks of life and affiliations." -- Chris Vognar

Take a look at the full article here.

We've arrived down in Austin for the World Premiere of Election Day at SXSW and the press has started to roll in. Check out this extensive interview with Katy Chevigny, the director of Election Day, on eFilmCritic.com.

Election Day is proud to be a part of the 2007 South by Southwest Film Festival in Austin, Texas. Our world premiere will be at 7:30 p.m., Saturday, March 10, 2007 at the Austin Convention Center. The film has been two and half years in the making and we're thrilled to have it begin its public life at such a great festival. We hope you can join us in Austin for one of the screenings. Director Katy Chevigny will conduct a Q&A after the Saturday and Tuesday night screenings.

Our Election Day party at SXSW will feature musical performances by Mandy Mercier, Beth Galiger and Jon Emery, all friends and musical collaborators of the fantastic Blaze Foley. The backstory: we feature a great song by the late great Austin singer/songwriter Blaze Foley at the end of our film and we are lucky enough to have some of Blaze's people join us to honor him for this celebration.

When: 6:00-8:00 p.m., Sunday March 11, 2007
Where: Ruta Maya Coffee House
3601 S. Congress Ave. in Austin
http://www.rutamaya.net
Drinks courtesy of Tito's Handmade Vodka