Cinematographer Peter Deming, ASC was brought onto The Good Lord Bird (Showtime) by Albert Hughes, who directed the first episode and served as an EP on the limited series which is based on James McBride’s novel of the same title. Set in the mid-19th century, The Good Lord Bird is told from the perspective of the fictionalized Henry “Onion” Shackleford, a teenager freed from slavery by abolitionist John Brown.
Onion joins Brown’s movement and goes on to meet the likes of Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglas. Onion then finds himself part of the historic Brown-led, three-day siege on the U.S. arsenal at Harpers Ferry, Virginia, in October 1859, intended to help spark a rebellion of slaves in the Southern states. Ultimately, the abolitionists were defeated by a company of U.S. Marines, and Brown was charged with treason and hanged. But the consequences of the raid resonated, with Harper’s Ferry regarded by many as the first battle of the Civil War.