Liani Greaves

But it was after going through the footage that I realized, holy cow, look at this assemblage of people.

Liani, share with us what it was like for you producing this film that your grandfather really conceived and executed in its raw state.

And then you and your father, you know, putting this together as a feature documentary.

What was it like for you in terms of the family legacy of this?

So that's really what really stood out, along with, of course, their innate brilliance.

The intellectual horsepower, so to speak, that's assembled in this room is extraordinary.

But, Liani, beyond that, beyond just the brilliance, the voices of everybody, and I'm wondering for you, you know, given the way people talk today, of course, that stood out to me was just how eloquent and how beautiful their voices were.

Yeah.

Biljana Tutorov, who's a co-director of The Holder Mountain.

And we had Liani Greaves, who is the producer, one of the two producers of Once Upon a Time in Harlem.

And of course, we also had Closure, which is directed by Michal Marchak.

And Michal was coming from Warsaw, Poland.

Wow.

Where did this footage come from? The film is produced by this dad-daughter duo of Liani and David Greaves.

And the original footage was shot by David's father, William Greaves.

And the film hadn't seen the light of day until now.

Amazing.

It truly is.

And so recently I caught up with David and Liani at the Mill Valley Film Festival.

And Liani shared with me just some insight about the filmmaking process, including this jewel right here.

I'm talking about Once Upon a Time in Harlem, which is also a great experiment in documentary.

And I'm here with one of the producers of the film, Liani Greaves, who is also William Greaves' granddaughter.

The film is...

I would say co-directed by William and his son, David.

Still waiting for my invite.

And by the way, William Greaves' granddaughter, Liani Greaves, is one of the producers here.

So this is truly a multi-generational family affair.

Absolutely.

Welcome.

And we also are fortunate to be joined by Liani Greaves, who is the producer of Once Upon a Time in Harlem.

Thank you all so much, and please get comfortable.

Your film, American Doctor, premiered at Sundance.

Well, thank you for your honesty.

Thank you all for these extraordinary films.

We have been privileged to be joined by Posey Tang, the director of American Doctor, Michal Marchak, the director of Closure, Biljana Tutorov, who, with Petr Klomozic, directed To Hold a Mountain, and Liani Greaves, the producer of Once Upon a Time in Harlem.

Let's thank them all.

One night, four cameras, and a cocktail party full of artists from the Harlem Renaissance.

Filmmakers David and Liani Greaves take audiences back to a fateful gathering in 1972 in their new documentary, Once Upon a Time in Harlem.

[upbeat music] Welcome to the program, everyone.

I'm Christiane Amanpour in London.

For the first time, we were aware of so many creative people who were Black

And all of them were aiming at the same thing, the struggle of the Negro, the rise of the Negro

David and Liani Greaves speak to Michel Martin about why America must remember the luminaries of Black history now more than ever

Thanks, Christiane.