“Inmates with Talent,” featuring Ice-T, is a groundbreaking reality/comedy movie about a wild talent contest in a prison with over 2,000 inmates. Comedians Johnny Collins and Joel Jerome somehow gain unprecedented access to Indiana’s Putnamville Correctional to clown around with the inmates—at times pushing the envelope—and, in the process, help turn their lives around. The duo organizes a talent contest that not only showcases many of the inmates’ hidden talents but also unites the entire prison population. Think “The Voice” meets “Last Comic Standing,” in the environment of “Orange is the New Black,” with the added benefit of a positive societal impact.
Professional comedians Steve Wilson – Comedy Central Live at Gotham and D.L. Hughley Radio Show, and Edwin San Juan – creator and Executive Producer of ‘SlantED Comedy’ (Showtime), join the cast to mentor the inmates and hit the stage as well.
Skinhead inmates and black drug dealers performing comedy on the same stage. Bank robbers turned opera singers crooning with R & B gang leaders… all hoping for a second chance at life.
Even if just a small number of convicts are steered away from a return to criminal activity, the film and its related initiatives will have a positive impact on society.
America has the largest prison population in the world, with more than 2 million behind bars today. The U.S. Justice Department reports, ‘If recent incarceration rates remain unchanged, an estimated 1 of every 15 persons (6.6%) will serve time in a prison during their lifetime.’
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