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The Klansman premieres in Los Angeles. Adapted from William Bradford Huie’s same-titled novel by Millard Kaufman and Samuel Fuller (who walked after his script was purportedly mangled by the studio), and directed by Terrence Young, the film stars Lee Marvin as the apathetic sheriff of a small Alabama town where a Ku Klux Klan-orchestrated campaign of rape, murder and racism has brought the local community to its knees. Richard Burton plays a boozy local squire who gets entangled in the unfolding melee. Allegedly both stars were drinking so heavily during the shoot that years later, neither could remember making the film. O.J. Simpson’s first starring role.
