Testimonial · OJ Brigance Courage Award · Year 2
“I was put here for a reason.”
An FCA project · produced as Regional Marketing Director, FCA Mid-Atlantic
The problem
Doing right by a serious story, and by someone this young.
Kristen's film had proven the OJ Award could work on video. McKenna was the year we took that model and pushed it as far as it could go. Her story was a heavy one: an eighth grader, hit and run over by a car at a bus stop, a broken hip, fractures across her body, airlifted to a children's hospital. The real challenge was never the footage. It was doing right by a story this serious, and doing it with someone this young.
The approach
Discover the Heartbeat
We interviewed two people, McKenna and her mom, who had been on the scene minutes after it happened. The mom carries the hardest medical facts so McKenna's own testimony can stay where it belongs, on her recovery and her faith. We spent close to three hours with them to get everything we needed.
Craft the Narrative
The arc moves from the accident, through a recovery she remembers day by day, to the turn where God became real to her, and it doesn't stop at survival. It lands on multiplication: McKenna and three friends started praying in the gym, and it grew.
Bring it to Life
Still one camera, so we ran each interview twice for a second angle, and this year we shot it on a better set of lenses. But the thing that carries the film is McKenna herself. She speaks about her faith with more clarity than most adults I have interviewed.
80
students now huddle in the gym every morning to pray. It started with McKenna and three friends.
“
There are now eighty of us who huddle in the gym every morning and pray over the day.McKenna
The result
It premiered at the Maryland FCA Funders Dinner and the room gave her a standing ovation, an even stronger response than the year before. People could not get over an eighth grader speaking the way she did.
Of the films in this series, this is the one I would call the peak.Braden · on the OJ Brigance series
What we delivered
A two-voice story film, the Funders Dinner premiere, YouTube, and reuse in the follow-up with donors.
Have a story that deserves to be honored, not just filmed?
Every film needs somewhere to land. The Storytelling System is the part that makes sure it does.