A hard-hitting documentary about life behind bars in California prisons -- that's not the film that Berkeley resident Katie Galloway set out to make. More.

This is documentary making at its best because it is, at heart, storytelling at its best. More.

In the small rural town of Susanville, Calif., once a thriving mill and farm community, the growing state prison system looms large as the new center for the local economy. Focusing on a local dairy farmer fighting to save his business, two friends switching careers to become prison guards and a former inmate trying to get his family back on its feet, filmmakers Katie Galloway and Po Kutchins paint an intimate portrait of America’s ever-growing prison industry and the people who live and work on both sides of the bars.

Filmmaker Katie Galloway

Filmmaker Po Kutchins

Recently, CCH conducted an interview about the making of “Prison Town” with the film’s directors, Katie Galloway and Po Kutchins.

Galloway’s work has been awarded the Society of Professional Journalists’ best documentary prize and has received two Emmy nominations (for the program “GunShots” and the “Frontline” documentary "The Case for Innocence"). She teaches at U.C. Berkeley.

Kutchins is an Emmy Award-winning producer and director. Her work includes a film profiling a juvenile on death row, a series on Doctors Without Borders, the acclaimed HBO film “Come Unto Me” and numerous A&E series, including “Family Plots.”

CCH : How did the idea for “Prison Town” come about?

Katie Galloway: We had both worked on several criminal-justice-related stories, and were struck by a growing phenomenon that the media didn’t seem to be covering — rural towns being taken over by the prison industry. We began to think about how prison growth affects people who work in the system -- and the communities where prisons had become the defining industry. What had they hoped for? What had happened to their towns? How had the landscape of these places been changed culturally, economically and psychologically?

CCH: Why did you select Susanville?

Po Kutchins: We researched dozens of communities across the country that had become prison towns, and Susanville offered a range of elements: a vivid past, a stunning setting — and a lot of prisons. It also still had a sense of identity, albeit threatened, unlike some towns that had been so incorporated into the prison system that there was little else left. And we were lucky that one of our field producers had family in the area, which helped us overcome the difficult hurdles of trust and access.

CCH : What was your approach to making the film?

PK. We wanted to tell the story in verité style as much as possible, so the viewer could be in the moment with the characters and understand the topic from an insider’s perspective. We wanted the characters to tell their own stories, in their own voices, rather than present a “voice of God” narrator. We didn’t want to insert our own opinions overtly. It was important to us to let the audience come to their own conclusions.

CCH : How did you find the individuals you feature in the film?

PK: The process of finding the characters for the story was quite difficult. People in Susanville, like those in many prison towns, tend to be distrustful of outsiders. We were from New York and the Bay Area, and locals were very hesitant to talk about anything related to the prison, particularly “on the record” — those who work in corrections are actually told not to talk to members of the press at all — and everyone else in the town is connected to the prisons in some way. Suspicion and reticence were everywhere. We found our characters one at a time, sometimes months apart, by developing local contacts and getting those people to trust us. But it was not easy.

CCH: Were there other challenges in making the film?

KG: Another big challenge was getting access to the prisons. They tend to be run like fiefdoms – and it’s up to individual wardens to decide whether to give you access or not. Especially at High Desert State Prison – a facility with a lot of violence that’s been subjected to much scrutiny over the years — they were extremely reluctant to let us in. Ultimately, the California Film Commission, a state agency, lobbied on our behalf. That and some administrative changes at the prison enabled us to get in.

CCH: What was the most satisfying aspect of making the film?

KG: On a micro level it was seeing Lonnie and Jennifer’s success. On a macro level it was bringing these little-known but very important issues to a broad national audience. The prison expansion issue tends to be very narrowly drawn in the public mind. We have all these criminals, so we have to have a place to put them, right?

There is not enough public discussion of the fallout from our incarceration policy. What is it doing to millions of children whose parents are in prison? To the more than 1 million nonviolent people incarcerated who live in these horrible environments and are then returned to our communities? What is it doing to the three-quarters of a million people who spend most of their waking hours working in these institutions? To their families? To their communities? What is it doing to us as a country financially, culturally and spiritually?

CCH : Is there anything you would have liked to include but couldn’t?

PK: It was impossible to cover as many aspects of prison expansion and incarceration as we would have liked to. We didn’t even touch on the ways the remote locations make it nearly impossible for incarcerated individuals to stay connected to their loved ones and communities. We weren’t able to spend another four to five years to observe the impact of prison work on the guards, but I think the townspeople’s testimonials hint at what some of the fallout may be.

CCH : How did the financing come together?

KG: Prison Town took four years to make. Once we settled on Susanville, we took a four-day trip from New York City to scout the town and shoot a development reel. We interviewed various people, filmed that gorgeous landscape, and put together a reel that foundations.

 We were shooting a little at a time until our first substantial grant came in -- from the Council and the Skirball Foundation [CCH's partner in funding for the California Documentary Project]. We were then able to spend much more time in Susanville, and that’s when we found most of our main characters. We followed their stories for about two years.

After putting together a new reel we got the KQED co-production and subsequent Independent Television Service finishing funds that allowed us to finish the film. And we were thrilled when P.O.V., the premier documentary series on PBS, picked it up for national broadcast. We also got a lot of help along the way from many talented and generous friends and colleagues.

CCH : What do you hope the audience will take away from the film?

KG: As several other recent documentaries - from “An Inconvenient Truth” to “The Smartest Men in the Room” -- have suggested, we are at a point in history where we need to significantly change our ways of thinking and living, or the consequences may be irreparable. We believe that examining the implications of prison expansion is a very important part of the debate over how to move forward as a society.

CCH : What advice would you impart to emerging filmmakers?