The Lawton Story

The Lawton Story places the annual Passion Play staged in Lawton, Oklahoma at the center of its screen time, showing extensive footage of local volunteers performing scenes from the life of Christ. That filmed pageant, narrated by radio announcer Knox Manning, forms the backbone of the picture. To extend the short documentary material into a full feature, the filmmakers added a light fictional frame about the pageant's preparations, following a handful of community figures and the child Ginger as they ready costumes, sets and spirits for opening night. The dramatic thread is simple and unobtrusive, meant to tie together the genuine pageant scenes without altering them.

Released in 1949, the movie was directed by William Beaudine with Harold Daniels handling the Passion Play sequences, and it credits Scott Darling as creator. The cast mixes local participants and working character actors, including Ginger Prince, Forrest Taylor, Millard Coody, Ferris Taylor and Gwynne Shipman.

There are no records of major awards or Academy recognition for this film, and it didn’t surface in Oscar or Golden Globe histories. It appears to have been treated as a small, regional release rather than a contender on the awards circuit.

Critics and historians tend to treat The Lawton Story as a hybrid film, part on-location religious pageant and part hastily written drama. That split personality affects tone: much of the movie feels like documentary observation, while the added story offers familiar Hollywood types and simple moral notes about faith and neighborliness. It’s aimed at family audiences and viewers interested in community pageants rather than art-house crowds.

The film’s clearest value today is archival. It preserves mid-20th century footage of a community Passion Play, capturing local faces, costumes and staging that would otherwise be lost. For regional film buffs, religious historians and those curious about small-town American pageantry, The Lawton Story stands as an unusual piece of social history more than a mainstream classic.