Monday, December 7, 2026 at 7:30 PM
Hammer Museum, Los Angeles
Followed by a conversation with director **David Greaves** and producer **Liani Greaves** The great American filmmaker William Greaves, who in his illustrious career of more than 50 years documented the civil rights movement and historical figures like Muhammad Ali, Paul Robeson, Ida B. Wells, and Raphe Bunche, who executive produced the groundbreaking PBS news program *Black Journal*, and who wrote and directed the radically experimental fiction hybrid *Symbiopsychotaxiplasm*, had one last trick up his sleeve before his death in 2014: He left behind an extraordinary archive of unedited footage from a cocktail party he staged and hosted in 1972 at the home of Duke Ellington, an astonishingly vital and poignant gathering of luminaries from the Harlem Renaissance, many of whom had not seen each other for nearly a half century. Among those assembled were the artists Aaron Douglas and Romare Bearden, the composers Eubie Blake and Noble Sissle, the photographer James Van Der Zee, the poet Arna Bontemps, and the actor Leigh Whipper. Now, some 50 years later, Greaves’ son David, one of three cameramen filming that day, has shaped this never-before-seen material into the beautiful and indelible *Once Upon a Time in Harlem*, carrying on the work of Greaves’ wife and longtime partner Louise Archambault Greaves and collaborating with Greaves’ granddaughter Liani and Anne de Mare as producers. 2026. USA. Directed by William and David Greaves. DCP courtesy NEON. 100 min. **$10 Hammer members | $20 general admission** Current members, check your email for your link to buy tickets, or contact [membership@hammer.ucla.edu](mailto:membership@hammer.ucla.edu). General admission tickets go on sale Monday, November 2 at 11 a.m. Enhance your movie experience as a member! Hammer Members receive priority seating and half-off Contenders tickets—plus discounts at the museum store and Lulu restaurant. [BECOME A MEMBER](https://hammer.ucla.edu/support/membership) *MoMA Contenders 2026* is organized by The Museum of Modern Art, New York. This film program is organized by Rajendra Roy, the Celeste Bartos Chief Curator of Film, Sean Egan, Senior Producer, Film Exhibitions and Projects, and Olivia Priedite, Film Program Coordinator, The Museum of Modern Art, New York. The Hammer Museum's presentation is made possible by The Billy and Audrey L. Wilder Foundation.