Emiel Cleaver, son of Congressman Emanuel Cleaver II of Missouri, reveals an important part of Kansas City’s–and our nation’s–history in his film Freedom is Now: A Documentary, which tells the story of Freedom, Inc., the groundbreaking political organization which empowered the city’s black community for both social and political change.

Dustin Lance Black’s play 8 -based on the trial transcripts of Perry v. Schwarzenegger, the landmark case which pitted marriage equality against its conservative foes, is one of the most important works of modern theater. A federal appeals court refused to allow the release of the trial videotapes because the trial judge, Vaughn Walker, had promised the pro-Prop 8 defendants that the videos would only be used by the court. 8 shows the arguments that justify bans on marriage for gay and lesbian couples, the testimony on marriage history from expert witnesses, and the arguments used to justify the ban on marriage equality.

A smart and poignant documentary, Phunny Business: A Black Comedy tells the story of All Jokes Aside, one of the most influential comedy clubs in the United States, which during its nine year run in Chicago became proving ground for some of the biggest names in comedy. In 1990, on a trip to Los Angeles Raymond Lambert, an MBA working in Chicago for entrepreneur Chris Gardner (The Pursuit of Happyness), visited The Improv on Mo’Bettah Mondays, the club’s black comedy showcase night.

We are honored to have Joe Berlinger back with us just days before the Oscars, where Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory his latest film (directed with Bruce Sinofsky) is nominated for Best Documentary. Paradise Lost 3 follows the case of the West Memphis Three and demonstrates the immense power of film to right wrongs and bring about change.

Tonight we have a special double feature. Co-directors Marshall Curry and Sam Cullman will discuss their Academy Award nominated film If a Tree Falls: A Story of the Earth Liberation Front for the first two-thirds of Movie Night before Sam leaves us, and in the final half hour we’ll delve into Racing Dreams, a look at three ‘tween NASCAR hopefuls during a season of the World Karting Association races, which Marshall directed.

How To Sell a Banksy follows the adventures of a quixotic Londoner who may have scored a very decent payday, or have bagged the ultimate white elephant when he peels a Banksy spray-painting off a bridge and then attempts to sell it.

The Power of Two, directed by Marc Smolowitz, is a powerful and evocative documentary about two extraordinary women, twins Anabel Stenzel and Isabel Stenzel Byrnes, their battle with the fatal genetic disease cystic fibrosis (CF) and their miraculous survival through double lung transplants. Their story takes us through their lives as they emerge as advocates for organ donation both in the United States and in in their mother’s native country, Japan, where they attempt to change the cultural resistance to the idea of organ donation.

Gary Jenkins, who brought us Negroes to Hire, joins us again tonight with another compelling and carefully crafted documentary about Kansas, slavery and the Civil War. With Freedom Seekers: Stories from the Western Underground Railroad, Jenkins traces the history of “Bloody Kansas,” and its place in the abolitionist movement. The Kansas Territory was key in the balance of the states before the Civil War, as neighboring Missouri was a slave state, bordered by two free states, Illinois and Iowa.

At some point everyone of a certain age must have dreamed of being an astronaut, of flying into space, boldly going where man had gone before. I grew up with a dad who was a human factor specialist for NASA, basically an on-earth test astronaut. Richard Garriott–one of our guests tonight and the subject of Man on a Mission–is the son of an astronaut, Owen Garriott who rode aboard Skylab 2; he wanted to follow in his dad’s footsteps. Fate, and bad eyesight, prevented him from becoming an official astronaut so he set off to make his dreams come true (and along the way, he became the father of a whole generation of computer gamers.)

You can’t miss the whiff as you drive along the 10 freeway heading to or from Arizona, a strange and horrifying stench, the Salton Sea. Chris Metzler–who visited us last year with “Everyday Sunshine: The Story of Fishbone”–co-directed “Plagues and Pleasures on the Salton Sea, an occasionally whimsical and deeply sad look at a man-made lake; the hopes, dreams and disasters that sprung from it; and the people who try to stay afloat on its shores.