Robert Clem has written, produced and directed works in film, television, radio and theater. Most frequently he has focused on fiction and nonfiction films set in his native Alabama, exploring and deconstructing its history, politics, literature, religion, music and its role as the nation’s central battleground in the movement for black civil rights.
Alabama-born singer and musician Willie Mae Thornton was a preacher’s daughter who went her own way. She joined a traveling variety show at age 14 and had a smash hit in 1953 with “Hound Dog” but had to struggle for another decade before the blues revival of the 1960s brought her back to the limelight. Given the name “Big Mama” at the Apollo Theater, she was tough, funny, a true original determined to do things her way and be the person she wanted to be.
Comparing Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky with the recent headline-grabbing story of accused assassin Luigi Mangione, The Suppressor is about the estranged son of a wealthy New York family who seeks revenge for the abduction and death of an immigrant friend. A mysterious woman named Sonia tries to stop him and, failing that, induces him to publicly confess his crime and the events that drove him to it..
Within the rich blues culture of Alabama is an energy and fulfillment of the state’s music community and a frankness about what it’s like to be black in Alabama. With music recorded at clubs, juke joints, festivals and dives across the state, the film demonstrates the hope and courage that things will get better by and by. With Jock Webb, “Hurricane” Elaine Hudson, Elnora Spencer, Jontavious Willis, B.J. Reed, Earl “Guitar” Williams and others. To be completed fall of 2026.