Over chicken and dumplings and cornbread muffins at the famed Florence’s Restaurant, Arthur Hurst and Vanessa Morrison are talking about the past, present and future of one of Oklahoma City’s long-forgotten gems.
“As a kid, going to the movies was about the only thing I got to do down on Fourth Street — but that was great,” Hurst recalls as camera operator Kevin Ford sits silently filming their conversation on a May afternoon. “It was always busy. … They had all those businesses up and down Fourth Street, so there was always people on Fourth Street.”
When he was growing up in Northeast Oklahoma City, Hurst says the YMCA on NE 4 stayed active all the time, and Washington Park was especially busy in the summer. But seeing movies at the Jewel Theatre, 904 NE 4, was one of his favorite things to do in the once-bustling Black neighborhood.
“It’s one of the last standing Black cultural assets that we still have,” Morrison says of the Jewel. “It’s about to be 100 years old. It survived urban renewal and all the changes and shifts that happened in that community. It is critical that we save it — and we will.”
“I hope so. It’s been a long time, and I’m not getting no younger,” replies Hurst, the Jewel Theatre’s longtime owner.
Rather than shouting “cut,” director Matt Payne steps up to the table and into the frame.
“All right, guys, we’re good. Now, we want Kevin to get one little scene if you don’t mind,” Payne says, guiding Hurst outside Florence’s so Ford can film the Jewel Theatre’s proprietor walking in and embracing Morrison, one of the leaders in the effort to save the endangered OKC landmark.
“We’re making a movie on a mission,” Payne tells The Oklahoman as he watches the scene play out on the last day of filming on the upcoming documentary “The Jewel.”
“It gives the people a chance to do the right thing — and that’s a unique perspective, to create something that is an advocacy piece that connects with our past and our future.”