Former classmates of film director Nate Parker, whose upcoming Oscar contender The Birth of a Nation has been overshadowed by allegations of sexual assault while he was at college, have sprung to his defense.
In a long open letter posted on The Root website, four former Penn State students criticized “the gross and blatant misinformation campaign regarding the events that took place during that time period,” adding: “We believed some 17 years ago that Jean Celestin and Nate Parker were innocent of rape, and we believe that now.”
Celestin, the co-writer of The Birth of a Nation, which depicts a slave revolt in 19th-century Virginia, was a college roommate of Parker’s at Penn State. The pair were accused of raping a female student while she was intoxicated and barely conscious. The accuser also claimed Parker and his roommate stalked, harassed and intimidated her after she went to authorities.
Parker was eventually acquitted while Celestin was convicted and sentenced to six months in jail. The conviction was later overturned on appeal based on the argument that he had had ineffective legal representation. A retrial did not go forward because the woman declined to testify.
The accuser ended up suing Penn State for $17,500, claiming the school did nothing to protect or help her during the ordeal. She committed suicide in 2012—a fact Parker discovered just as the promotional campaign began for The Birth of a Nation.
Until recently the film, which Parker stars in as well as directs, was a front-runner for an Academy Award, especially in view of 2015’s #OscarsSoWhite row.
But the heightened sensitivities caused by the controversy led to cancelation of a screening and Q & A of the film that was scheduled for tomorrow, and there will be no press conference to accompany the film’s premiere at next month’s Toronto Film Festival.
Hollywood cheerleaders for The Birth of a Nation, which will be released on October 7, such as veteran director Spike Lee, have been conspicuously silent about the controversy. But the Reverend Al Sharpton recently stuck up for Parker, saying that the”right-wing media” is out to “smear” him: “Now, all of a sudden, they rediscover what they already knew. The way you kill the message is you try to smear the message.”
Parker addressed the controversy on Facebook last week, writing: “I am filled with profound sorrow. I can’t tell you how hard it is to hear this news. I can’t help but think of all the implications this has for her family.”
He continued: “While I maintain my innocence that the encounter was unambiguously consensual, there are things more important than the law. There is morality; no one who calls himself a man of faith should even be in that situation.
“As a 36-year-old father of daughters and person of faith, I look back on that time as a teenager and can say without hesitation that I should have used more wisdom.”
