EST. 1978
Groundswell Media founded by Peter Barton, in partnership with documentary legend George Stoney, forty-five years ago at a time when portable video was still in its early stages. Peter recognized the potential of this emerging medium to effectively connect with both new and existing audiences while utilizing a tool that showcased the authentic humanity of its subjects, as opposed to the artificial glamour of film.
The company's work is characterized by a documentary-like quality that emphasizes improvisation and real-life settings. It frequently draws inspiration from the personal experiences of its actors and uses real situations as a foundation for fictional stories. Despite its factual roots, the work has a profound dramatic impact. Peter's career has spanned the genres of both drama and documentary, as well as encompassing roles as a teacher, and media pioneer. He has been a social activist, an organizer, and a documentarian, but his true passion lies in working with actors, particularly young ones. His preferred approach is a highly collaborative process which emphasizes brainstorming, improvisation, and discovery, resulting in unique, engaging, and authentic work.
The company has produced both dramas and documentaries. Barton’s fictional work uses
improv to draw out stories based on real personal experience. His documentaries are always
built with dramatic structure and storytelling in mind, so there are questions to be answered,
tensions to be resolved.
Groundswell Media films include "Determined to Dance," "The Suicide Auditions," "Cries from Nagasaki," "Women of '69, Unboxed," "Parkinson's Third Wind," and more
from Cries from Nagasaki
from "Taking the Stage," proposal for a documentary
"Girl with Butterfly," circa 1970s
The majority of the films produced by Groundswell Media are documentaries. However, the company has also produced two fiction films using an exceptional improvisational technique.
In this method, the actors engage in discussions regarding scenes and storylines, and then create live drama spontaneously. This approach produces a unique blend of documentary-like realism and spontaneity while still following a narrative structure that is mapped out on the fly by the director and actors. Groundswell refers to this technique as "video theater" and is proud to serve as a model for other filmmakers to follow. Notably, The Suicide Auditions was created using this approach, and to a lesser extent, Cries from Nagasaki.
Taking the Stage
We Rise Up Singing
A film about the Brooklyn Women’s Chorus and the courage and resilience it takes to step up, find your voice, sing a solo.
Groundswell Media is happy to announce that We Rise Up Singing has been selected for the following festivals:
Barton, a distinguished director, producer, and writer, has been the recipient of multiple awards for his exceptional contributions to the entertainment industry. He has received three Emmy nominations, three CINE Golden Eagles, and an Edward R. Murrow Award for his outstanding work. His productions have been featured on prominent platforms such as Showtime, HBO, WNET, and WCBS, and several of his films have been permanently housed in the collections at the Museum of Modern Art. Barton's academic background includes a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from Dartmouth, which he earned in 1963. He then pursued a Master of Fine Arts in Playwriting and Directing from Yale Drama School, where he was responsible for founding the Morse College Dramatic Group in 1966. His play, "Dawn Song," about Chief Joseph and the Nez Perce tribe was performed at Morse that same year. Barton served as a Peace Corps volunteer from 1967-68. As a professor of screenwriting and film production at NYU, Barton had the privilege of teaching alongside Marty Scorsese from 1969 to 1971. Oliver Stone was a student. He also worked as a crew member on the 1970 documentary film Woodstock. Barton returned to teach at NYU again from 1979 to 1980, this time alongside the esteemed filmmaker George Stoney. Barton's noteworthy contributions to literature include his book on un-rich, un-famous performing artists, published by Dial Press in 1980, entitled "Staying Power." This compelling work was specifically intended to inspire and motivate young people to pursue fulfilling careers in the performing arts, even if it did not result in fame or fortune. Barton's book of poetry, "When All is After," will be published this year by Finishing Line Press.
Eddie (1970) with Laurence Salzmann – portrait of a dying alcoholic in a welfare hotel in New York. Barton’s editing mirrors the disintegration of the subject’s consciousness as he loses his only friend, walks the streets “trying to get away from myself…” Included in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art.
Janie’s Janie (1971) – with Geri Ashur, Stephanie Palewski, Marilyn Mulford, Frances Jackson. A Newsreel film, also included in MOMA’s permanent collection. A poor mother of 5 in Newark’s tough Ironbound district dares to step out into the community, speak out against injustice, help organize a day care center.
Riff ’65 (1966)– with Eric Camiel – Won the equivalent of a Student Academy Award before that category was formally established. A young boy of color endures initiation into a gang, mirroring pressures to show he’s tough by enlisting to fight in Vietnam. His response is to draw action figures, climb high buildings like Spiderman, wreck anything he can reach.
Names Can Really Hurt Us- a CBS-Anti-Defamation League special, was given the Edward R. Murrow Award and 3 Emmy nominations. Young people share experiences of discrimination and declare their determination to fight for change.
Hatebusters - public service announcements on WNET-NY where young people sing, dance, rap and just speak out against prejudice.
Love/Hate/Prejudice/Peace- WNET-NY young people’s “town hall” where emerging voices speak out and sing for justice.
Disabled veterans at a fictional version of Walter Reed create a springboard DIVING team called The Brew Angels, after their favorite fuel. Their morale is low and their rehab facility, like the real Walter Reed, is threatened with closing. Conquering their fears and inhibitions, the vets hop out onto the high board and take flight, reclaiming futures they thought had been stolen from them.Their coach is their night nurse, a former high school star who could use some rehab herself.The success of the team draws attention to the way all vets are under-served and under-respected these days.
By accident, three kids video a suicide at Niagara Falls. Word gets around this desperately poor town. On-edge residents ask about also leaping: doing the ultimate YouTube. The kids' answer: auditions. Tell everyone they didn't get the part.
Official selection at Cannes Shorts Center, Sedona, Newport, LA, and Hollywood DV Film Festivals. Created with Barton’s “video theater” improvisational approach to filmmaking. Was created in the voice of children flung through the air by the atomic bomb. To create this effect, a trampoline was used with the camera on its side, so that the children appear to be flying.
Women of '69, Unboxed is a documentary film directed by Peter Barton that showcases the experiences of 19 women who graduated from Skidmore College in 1969, during a time when it was an all-women college. The film explores the challenges these women faced in regards to marriage, careers, and the decision to have children. Women of '69, Unboxed has won two awards at film festivals and offers a poignant and inspiring testament to the strength and resilience of these women.
A portrait-in-motion of Company 'd' from Memphis, dancers with Down syndrome who are all about POSSibility, says self-advocate Amanda, not disability.Our movie features a poignant performance to "Somewhere", from West Side Story, interviews with dancers and parents, an exploration of tough issues like aging parents and the difficulty of finding meaningful work.
This video was created as part of the outreach and recruitment for Common Cents, a powerful, joyous program that began in NYC schools and is spreading to other parts of the country.Teddy and Nora Gross began with a simple idea: pennies are everywhere, often overlooked, treated with condescension. Not unlike young people.They created an organization that mobilizes students to collect pennies door to door and bring them in to school. Those pennies add up. A few years ago they created a giant Penny Field at Rockefeller Center filled with their Harvest. Total amount collected: nearly A MILLION DOLLARS.The beauty part is that the funds collected go back to each school and a student-run committee decides what group in the community will receive a grant to further its good work. So students become activists with clout, the power of the purse, able to make real changes in their neighborhoods. So they're more likely to continue to want to change the world in the future, since they've been successful in this first enterprise.We created some original music for the video, having fun We- Are -The -World-style.
Barton is always looking for stories of courage, journeys of people facing daunting odds.
This documentary follows the battles of two Parkinson’s patients to remain active, creative,
joyful and productive in spite of their illness. They fight back by painting, dancing, exercising,
writing, singing and, most dramatically, BOXING.
Barton's latest story of courage in the face of long odds: We Rise Up Singing, a portrait of the Brooklyn Women's Chorus, led by Peter's old friend Bev Grant, who co-wrote the theme song from Janie's Janie some 50 years ago. Barton focuses again on courage, the pluck it takes to step out from the chorus and take a risk, find your voice, sing a solo. Because of the pandemic, the Chorus wasn't able to sing together so Barton and veteran editor Melissa Kinski brought them together with some digital magic.
Barton worked on this film after graduating from Yale Drama in 1966. During that period, the ongoing Vietnam War inspired his idea for a movie about a young climber who sought to escape the violence on the streets. The film's script initially faced some disagreements, but the wife of one of Barton's teachers helped them cast a young black/latin/Native American kid who fit the scenario perfectly. The legendary Haig Manoogian, mentor to Martin Scorsese, suggested they do a documentary about the young actor, Riff, instead. Thus, the documentary took shape, combining Barton's scenario with Riff's personal experiences. The resulting film won an award equivalent to a student Academy Award, though Barton was only credited as an associate director and scenarist. Following this accomplishment, he met with Stan Lee and cherished the memory. He ran into Riff years later on the Upper West Side, where he still had his infectious smile and a love for art.
"Not a character I'm too fond of but definitely a character. What a sad, lonely, desperate, miserable lost soul searching for belonging but searching in the wrong places. Hate groups that blame others for their own self inflicted misery. What's that quote, what Soberness conceals, drunkenness reveals? I didn't like him too much but I also felt sorry for him. That little brother story got me. Poor pathetic alcoholic." I walk miles on end trying to get away from myself" Wow, that says a lot." - @koyoteman58
"Sad as hell to watch. Poor lost soul, member of anti-semitic group. Given what's going on in the world today I bet he'd have more friends than he could shake a stick if he were still alive." - @anothonydavid51212
A groundbreaking documentary shown at the First Women's Film Festival in 1971. A loving portrait of Jane Giese, single mother of five in the Ironbound section of Newark. We track Janie's growth and empowerment as she realizes she is a valuable worker in the home and can be an influential organizer/activist in this working-class community.
Photo montage promoting the rebuilding of the outdoor stage at the Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival. Music by Sigur Ros
In addition to his esteemed work in other media, Barton is also an activist/poet. His page of poems in the voice of Vietnamese farmers was published in the Saturday Review in 1971.
When all the greenery is gone
And the wind that kept us tossing
Has died in the grass by the river
You will be laughing still, I know
Chin tucked madly
Against your chest
And for your midnight reminiscences
A toilet seat kept warm
For your sighs and singing.
I will still be waitingIn the long echoing hall
Leaning my grateful shadow
Against the grinning wall.
And as you roll home
My dreams will track you
Down side streets, cackling
While swallows call and streetcars clang
And the little cracks in the dawn
Fly off singing.
Barton's book by the same title is now available from Finishing Line Press.
A wet Saturday night
And the girls can't decide
To go uncool with umbrellas
Or risk their curls without.
The street sways free
Looking for a fight
Late for a connection
No prowling tonight.
Not for me.
With you, sweet boy
I'm always where I want to be.
We are taken by the give
Of our dusky rug
The amnesty of the evening
Heals up our headlines.
I stroke your forehead
As my father stroked mine
Though never long,
Never long Enough…
And I realize how much
Through all my life
I've expected what I gave
To come back to me.
But all I got
Was a chance at the end
To stroke my dad's hair
As he lay dying.
It took us that long
To turn all the tables.
So I stopped waiting for boomerangs
Of such unwrinkled joy
Giving doesn't mean
You get.
We don't breathe as one
You are twice as fast
Muffled in my armpit
Your hair so fine
It sticks to my chin
Reminds me to shave.
I have you now
So close to my life
That it seems very near
When you'll stroke my hair
As I stroked my father's
On that dry rainy night
When the walls drew in…
Send us your resume, and we'll let you know if we have a position that fits your experience.