FOCUSED ON ‘5TH WARD’
TV series delves into the stories that make culturally diverse neighborhood a Houston treasure
Greg Carter didn’t spend much of his life in Fifth Ward, but time there nevertheless left an impression on the filmmaker. More than 20 years ago, he made a movie, “Fifth Ward,” about the neighborhood where he settled when his family moved here from Arkansas.
As Houston evolved, Carter realized his story about this neighborhood also needed to change. So he created “5th Ward,” a show shot and set in the historic Houston neighborhood that wrapped its second season this weekend. (There will be a third season, but it’s not scheduled yet.)
“5th Ward” has drawn local attention after the city last week celebrated the neighborhood just northeast of downtown that yielded notable civic leaders like Mickey Leland and Barbara Jordan, jazz greats like Milt
Larkin, Jean-Baptiste “Illinois” Jacquet and Joe Sample, and hip-hop stars like DJ Premiere and the Geto Boys’ Willie D.
Carter started the TV show several years ago, thinking the neighborhood was a provocative metaphor for 21st-century America.
“This is not a monolithic Black neighborhood,” he says. “We started the show wanting to tell many stories about different races in this neighborhood: Asian, Black, Latino, Middle Eastern … you name it. I felt like I had an obligation to tell a story that was grounded in what was happening there.”
Carter boasts that his show has a dozen different cultures and nationalities represented and six different languages spoken. He also committed to shooting in Houston despite its logistical complications. The city’s summers are unforgiving, and production on the first season was interrupted by Hurri
cane Harvey.
But Carter feels he couldn’t have told his Houston story anywhere else. And he feels TV is the perfect medium to tell a story unique to the city where he grew up, but one relatable to other places in 21st-century America.
“If you go to France and visit the old caves, the people who made that art thousands of years ago, you don’t know the name of the chief or his tribe,” he says. “You don’t know who was out hunting antelope or who was inside cooking food. But the art on the walls of caves, that has stayed. That’s why art is so important. It’s a time capsule.”
Honored by the city
So Carter is thrilled that a ceremony was held Friday at 5th Level Cafe on Market Street to recognize the neighborhood and its landmarks.
The show’s roots spring from a 2016 meeting with Mayor Sylvester Turner, who met with the film industry in hopes of bringing shoots to Houston.
“We got a letter of support,” Carter says. “And that was what we needed to put this together.”
He found a willing partner in Sylvia George with the network UMC. He also cites producer Dominique Telson with helping to get the show made.
Carter set about writing a panoramic story that hit on the neighborhood’s diversity. Production was interrupted by Hurricane Harvey, but it aired in spring 2018. The second season started its rollout this summer. And during the pandemic, UMC is making both seasons available for free for one month on its website, umc.tv.
The show includes some interviews with Houston residents. Carter is particularly proud of one with Stephen Klineberg, a Rice University professor who has studied demographic changes in Houston. It aired at the end of last week’s episode.
“He talked about how Fort Bend County was 25 percent Latino, 25 percent Asian, 25 percent white and 25 percent African American,” Carter says. “And how that made Houston the model for a national
melting pot. It’s interesting because here you can’t run on politics. You can’t be a Republican or Democrat: You have to be someone who is willing to do things for everybody.”
Club Matinee
Immersed in Houston, Carter has found other projects to snare his attention. He’s serving as a producer and writer for a documentary about Club Matinee, a Fifth Ward nightclub that dated back to the 1930s and served as a hub for entertainment in the neighborhood.
While the renowned Fruits of Fifth Ward mural honors notable people who came from the neighborhood, the new mural touches more on historic institutions: clubs, churches, hospitals and schools.
“This Fifth Ward mural, and this film, we’re trying to preserve the architecture of the neighborhood,” Carter says. “Some of it is preservation while things are changing. But it’s about the past and the future. About a living neighborhood.”