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#movie #hotdrama2026 #trending #bestmovie2026 #Mysteries of the Abandoned S13 Episode 8 Engsub - BEST MOVIE 2026
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00:00A French compound, where a staggering deception was launched.
00:05What unfolded was one of the great spy stories of the Second World War.
00:11An iconic Philadelphia venue that set the stage for era-defining artists.
00:18All these famous entertainers, it was electric in here.
00:23And a mansion in Malaysia, the scene of a baffling crime.
00:28This house was the site of a brutal killing.
00:31His body was found with a shotgun wound to the back of the head.
00:44Eighty miles from the Bulgarian capital, Sofia, is a hidden facility.
00:49The propaganda mouthpiece of a repressive regime.
00:57There's forest as far as the eye can see.
01:00It feels remote, out of the way.
01:03The perfect place to hide something.
01:06Then out of the trees rises its structure.
01:09The whole thing has an ominous feel.
01:12It's massive and concrete.
01:15It is one of these Eastern European communist monoliths.
01:21Among the derelict remains, there are clues to why it was built in such an isolated location.
01:29Inside, it's been virtually stripped to the walls, but there's a few hints that it was a highly technological structure.
01:38There are these channels cut into the floor, maybe for pipes or cables.
01:43You can also see platforms that look like the bases for some kind of machinery.
01:49It has its own power line leading to it.
01:53So clearly, whatever happened here required an enormous amount of electricity.
01:58Could this have been some kind of secret government office or military research facility?
02:06Created to fight a disinformation campaign from deep behind the Iron Curtain, when the West gained the edge, this Cold
02:15War confrontation turned hot.
02:19The Bulgarian government's control over information was so complete and so paranoid, they were even willing to launch a daring
02:29assassination in the streets of London.
02:37This was where I had my first serious job.
02:40It was truly impressive, because the security was just like at a state border.
02:47Spiridon Herizanov began working here as a technician in September 1988, when Bulgaria was part of the communist Soviet bloc.
02:59This place was buzzing with life. Over 100 people worked here.
03:06Construction on this high security government complex began in 1974.
03:13But it was designed to take part in a fight that began decades earlier.
03:20The Cold War was as much a political and ideological battle as a military confrontation.
03:27As the Eastern and Western superpowers were facing off with their nuclear arsenals, another unseen battle was unfolding over the
03:36airwaves.
03:36These structures were part of communist Bulgaria's attempt to convert the world to their way of thinking, using international radio
03:47broadcasting.
03:50This was the heart of some of the transmitters.
03:53And here was the booth with the control panel.
03:58This complex had enough power, it was said, to broadcast a shortwave signal six times around the world.
04:07Everything broadcast from here was propaganda.
04:12Some programs were aimed at Bulgarians living abroad, but a large part of them were aimed at another audience.
04:20Latin America, North America, West Africa, in various languages.
04:27We broadcast to some of the farthest corners of the world.
04:32This is the Podarsko Radio Center.
04:36Its transmissions included speeches from the country's leader, Todor Zhivkov, praising Bulgaria as a socialist workers' paradise.
04:46The reality was very different.
04:48Bulgaria was a complete police state.
04:53There were eyes and ears everywhere.
04:56People were not permitted to know anything that their dictators didn't want them to know.
05:07So Western nations set up operations to broadcast to various countries behind the Iron Curtain.
05:13There were several of these operations, Voice of America, Radio Liberty, Radio Free Europe, and the BBC.
05:20And all of these radio stations are designed to have real journalists sending real news to parts of the world
05:31where all they were fed was government propaganda.
05:37Those broadcasts were our only way of learning what was truly happening in Bulgaria and the rest of the world.
05:44They also broadcast a lot of interviews with political leaders like President Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, entertainers like Elizabeth Taylor,
05:53Tom Jones, civil rights leaders including Martin Luther King.
05:57But it wasn't just American voices and celebrities that were beaming into Bulgaria.
06:03Exiles and dissidents were brought in to broadcast their criticisms of the regime back into the country.
06:11Help us to keep our young people from falling under the influence of the Communists.
06:18In 1969, one of these political opponents fled to the west.
06:24From there he took to the airwaves, attacking the Bulgarian regime.
06:29His name was Georgi Markov.
06:32He had settled in England, where he worked for Radio Free Europe, the BBC, and other radio stations broadcasting back
06:40into his home country.
06:41I believe there isn't a single Bulgarian who hasn't listened to Georgi Markov's program in absentia reports about Bulgaria.
06:51Markov is being very pointed in his criticism of the Bulgarian government and of Todor Zhivkov, who was the Bulgarian
07:03dictator.
07:04Markov is a very dangerous nuisance.
07:09Fearing his shows could incite a rebellion, Bulgarian authorities turned to facilities like Podarsko to stop them.
07:20This particular building housed the so-called lightning jamming transmitter, which was used to disrupt enemy radio stations.
07:27However, we also had another nickname for it, the buzzer.
07:33During shows they thought were particularly damaging, like Markov's shows, they would tune to that channel, broadcast on the same
07:42frequency, interfering noise, music, crazy sounds.
07:47Here's the Soviet government's 120 million dollars a year direct answer to Radio Liberty.
07:56Jamming.
07:57But those determined to tune into Markov's shows found a way.
08:05A person could arrange their antenna in a certain way, or maybe drive out in the countryside, and they could
08:12often wind up hearing these broadcasts.
08:16I listened to Radio Free Europe at home almost every day, even though my colleagues, who had just taken over
08:23the shift from me, were trying to jam it.
08:28Infuriated that Markov's attacks continued to be heard, the regime decided to take direct action.
08:36They were willing to go anywhere and do anything to stop people telling the truth.
08:48In the late 1970s, communist Bulgaria was using the Podarsko Radio Center to jam enemy transmissions from the West.
08:58Dissident journalist Georgi Markov, broadcasting from London, was their public enemy number one.
09:06But they weren't that successful at blocking these transmissions.
09:12The Bulgarian authorities were so outraged that they took a desperate measure.
09:18On September the 7th, 1978, Markov was walking across London's Waterloo Bridge, heading for his job at the BBC.
09:26Suddenly, he felt a sharp pain in his leg, as if he had been stung by an insect.
09:32When that happened, he saw somebody bend over and pick up an umbrella and walk away.
09:40And he thought no more about it.
09:42But by that evening, he was deathly ill and went to the hospital.
09:46They couldn't really figure out what was wrong with him, except for a tiny puncture in the back of his
09:50leg.
09:51But four days later, he was dead.
09:54There's a widespread theory that a Bulgarian Secret Service officer had an umbrella capable of injecting a pellet of ricin
10:04poison into Markov's leg, and the poison killed him.
10:09Across the West, the attack was front page news.
10:14But in Bulgaria, the official line was complete silence.
10:19The news couldn't have got out here.
10:22He was considered an enemy of the people.
10:24It was on Radio Free Europe, or the BBC, that I learned about the murder of Georgi Markov.
10:32Markov's killers were never brought to justice.
10:35And Podarsko continued to operate until a wave of democratic protests toppled the regime in the late 80s.
10:44Right after the political changes in 1989, we stopped using the jamming transmitter.
10:51In 1990, Todor Zhivkov was arrested and put on trial for corruption and abuse of power.
10:59He died while under house arrest eight years later.
11:04This facility was still used to transmit Radio Bulgaria for another couple of decades.
11:13February 1st, 2012, was my last day of work here.
11:20And after that, this place gradually turned into the scrap and ruins you see today.
11:36No one has nostalgic memories of this facility.
11:40No one is organizing fundraising to restore it or turn it into a park or a museum.
11:47It sits here out in the forest, abandoned, a bad memory of a very dark time.
11:56In Malaysia's Penang province, tales of haunting and violence swirl around an isolated relic.
12:09We're in a lush, tropical area.
12:12And at first, all you see is trees. It looks like an unbroken forest.
12:16In the middle of it all is this large, imposing ruin.
12:20Clearly, no one has lived here for a very long time.
12:24But the sparse interior does hold evidence of who built this place.
12:30You can tell it was once a luxurious residence for a very wealthy person.
12:35But it doesn't look like a traditional Malay building.
12:39It's been built from heavy stone with palatial European features.
12:44Could this be a colonial structure?
12:46Built using the profits from an incredible resource boom.
12:51As a family tried to reassert dominance over this land, it became the scene of a twisted crime.
12:58It's one of Malaysia's most famous unsolved murders, but there are no shortage of theories.
13:09This is what we call a secret, mysterious place.
13:13You could feel the presence of something in the past.
13:19When Clement Liang first visited this grand ruin, locals told him about a spirit they believe still stock these halls.
13:30When I came here in 2006, there was actually a picture of a Hindu god on the staircase.
13:39So I was curious and asked the catechist, why you did it?
13:42Oh, the spirit of John is still around.
13:45We need to have some deity to console his spirit.
13:50John's full name was John St. Moore Ramsden.
13:54He was part of a colonial dynasty who controlled vast amounts of land in British Malaya in the 1870s.
14:04At first, the estate grew sugarcane.
14:07But a technological advancement would lead to a far more lucrative crop being grown here.
14:13This radical transformation began with a revolutionary discovery made more than 9,000 miles away in Woburn, Massachusetts.
14:26In the mid-19th century, a self-taught American chemist named Charles Goodyear started tinkering with rubber to try to
14:33make it more durable and tougher and more elastic.
14:36Eventually, he came across a formula that was stretchy, but could return to its original shape.
14:43There was nothing quite like it.
14:47Rubber very quickly became one of the most in-demand products in the world.
14:53Malaysia turned out to be one of the best places to grow rubber.
14:57And within a few years, it was making more than a third of the world's supply.
15:02The Ramsden's family changed all this into a huge rubber plantation.
15:09Instead of traveling from Britain themselves, they hired managers to run the estates.
15:15This building was built in 1917 to be the administration and also the residence for the managers.
15:23And it was called Caledonia House.
15:26Over the subsequent decades, demand for rubber continued to boom.
15:32And from their luxurious mansion, the Ramsden family's managers oversaw an increasingly diverse workforce.
15:41As the Malaysian economy grew, it pulled in hundreds of thousands of immigrants from China and elsewhere who mixed with
15:49the indigenous Malaysian population.
15:51The family were raking in the cash.
15:55At the time, it was said to be the most valuable European holding in British Malaya.
16:00But this massive wealth was being watched jealously from overseas.
16:05And soon, war would bring disaster to Caledonia Plantation.
16:10On December the 8th, 1941, almost simultaneously with their attack on Pearl Harbor, the Japanese army invaded British Malaya.
16:22They had enormous resources, including these rubber plantations.
16:27Those were vital for Japan's military efforts.
16:32They swept through the country at lightning speed and after just three months, the unprepared British surrendered in Singapore.
16:41Caledonia was now under Japanese occupation.
16:44But the British would do whatever it took to regain control of the valuable colony.
16:51Leading to the funding and arming of communist guerrillas to continue the fight behind enemy lines.
16:57With the communists' help, Japan was defeated in 1945.
17:03But when Britain returned to Malaya, these guerrilla fighters switched their focus from one colonial oppressor to another.
17:12The British wanted these guerrillas to surrender their weapons.
17:16But they wanted to liberate Malaya from the British control.
17:21So they actually started a war again.
17:24To these insurgents, families like the Ramsdons were the ultimate symbol of colonial exploitation.
17:32Those British planters were seen as their target.
17:37Soon, a violent murder would plunge this mansion into chaos.
17:45In 1946, Caledonia House in Malaysia lay at the heart of a valuable rubber plantation, ruined under Japanese occupation during
17:56the Second World War.
17:58Its British colonial owners, the Ramsdons, were determined to restore it despite a growing local armed resistance.
18:07The patriarch of the family sent his son, John, to repair the estate.
18:14He is said to have treated the plantation workers well, offering them lavish dinners at the house, and even having
18:22their children driven to school in his car.
18:25But no matter how good his relationship with the workers might have been, at the end of the day, this
18:31was a colonial enterprise that was built on racism and inequality.
18:35Two years after John Ramsden arrived here, these tensions would come to a head.
18:44On the 8th of June, 1948, it was a hot, steamy evening.
18:51John just finished his work, and he was staying here alone.
18:55And he walked back, and he was about to climb up the stairs.
19:00Two gunshots were heard, bang, bang.
19:05The estate watchman and three plantation workers heard the shots and rushed inside.
19:12And they all found our John lying on this staircase with blood gushing out.
19:20And he died right on this spot.
19:23When the police arrived, they began combing the mansion and its grounds for evidence.
19:30Outside, they found two spent shotgun shells underneath one of the rubber trees.
19:38Very quickly, John Ramsden's murder got connected with a much bigger story.
19:45Over the following couple of weeks, other overseers of plantations in Malaysia were also killed.
19:52And these killings were connected with a communist insurgency that was sweeping the islands.
19:57So there were some saying that, yes, John was also murdered by these communist guerrillas.
20:04But the police officer in charge of the case, William Haynes, was not convinced that this was a political assassination.
20:13He believed evidence uncovered at the murder scene pointed towards an inside job.
20:20Near the body, they found a pair of shoes that didn't seem to belong to anybody working at the residence.
20:27They found out later, these shoes belonged to a worker by the name of Mohamed Hamjan.
20:34It seemed like an open and shut case, but he claimed he'd been framed.
20:39Another suspect was John Ramsden's driver.
20:42And it was said that Ramsden was having an affair with the driver's sister.
20:49So he might have had a powerful motive for the killing.
20:54Both Mohamed Hamjan and the driver were arrested.
20:58But there was a fatal flaw in the police's case.
21:01With the murder weapon still missing, and only circumstantial evidence to go on, they were released.
21:08On September 3rd, 1948, 87 days after John's murder, the investigation was halted.
21:17So we're still wondering, who actually killed Mr. John Ramsden?
21:22Still a big, big mystery.
21:25Back in Britain, the Ramsden family was so heartbroken that they ordered the liquidation of all of their holdings in
21:33Malaya, including the Caledonia plantation.
21:37After a long and brutal insurgency against British rule, in 1963, the independent country of Malaysia was established.
21:47And Caledonia House was left to ruin.
21:56After its abandonment, life for the Caledonia House went from bad to worse.
22:01In 2020, a fire ripped through the property.
22:05And later, a commercial crane working nearby tipped over and smashed through the roof.
22:12Caledonia House has such a significant historical value that I hope people one day would be able to not only
22:23save it, but restore the whole building.
22:31In the French capital, a decaying compound holds secrets of an extraordinary deception.
22:44We're in the quiet outskirts of Paris, and under this looming broadcast tower is a collection of buildings that look
22:52significantly older.
22:54This feels institutional, or perhaps military.
22:58But as you look closer, you notice something more sinister.
23:01Built into these walls are rows of casemates, but instead of windows, they have heavy iron bars.
23:08These were clearly repurposed as prison cells, but who were they keeping here?
23:13During the Second World War, thousands were detained inside these walls.
23:19But one man would make his escape and do untold damage to the Nazi regime.
23:24He convinces British counterintelligence that he really is a German spy who is willing to be a double agent.
23:35He would become one of the most notorious spies of his entire generation.
23:40He was known as Agent Zigzag.
23:45In Paris, France, lies an oppressive compound linked to a daring wartime double cross.
23:54Thomas Fontaine has spent decades uncovering its story.
23:59We're in a place of great importance to the history of France's occupation between 1940 and 1944, but a site
24:08that remained largely unknown until the early 2000s.
24:13It was built in the 1830s as part of a ring of defenses around the capital.
24:19But these days, it's not known for its protection of the city, but rather something far more menacing.
24:26In May and June of 1940, the German armed forces very rapidly encircle the French and British armies in northeastern
24:35France.
24:37The French state surrenders.
24:41Paris was under occupation.
24:44Here on the edge of the city was a valuable asset, and the Germans weren't going to let that go
24:49to waste.
24:50The Nazi occupiers quickly transformed it from a place to keep enemies out into a facility to contain them.
25:00This is Fort de Romanville.
25:05The primary function was to be a camp specifically for nationals of enemy powers.
25:12There were many British nationals who were arrested specifically because Germany was at war with England.
25:20One of those inmates was an English petty criminal who fled the country and was captured in Nazi-occupied territory.
25:30His name was Eddie Chapman.
25:34Eddie Chapman was interned in the men's section, likely in one of the rooms on the ground floor.
25:41There was no contact with the outside world, rations were strict, and prisoners could be executed without any explanation or
25:49warning.
25:50Chapman realized he wasn't going to survive this place.
25:53And four months into his imprisonment, he found the lifeline.
25:59His salvation came from a shadowy Nazi organization, the Abwehr, Germany's intelligence service.
26:08The Abwehr are searching for V-men, individuals who will provide intelligence and engage in espionage.
26:16From the beginning of the Second World War, the Germans had tremendous difficulty recruiting agents in England.
26:26So the German intelligence people go to Chapman and they say, can you go and be a German agent?
26:36Chapman accepts the German intelligence offer, and he's told that he needs to blow up the de Havilland aircraft factory
26:46in England.
26:48On December 16th, 1942, Chapman parachuted into Britain for his first mission.
26:55He was carrying a radio, a pistol, a cyanide pill, and close to a thousand pounds in cash.
27:04On the morning of February 1st, 1943, British newspapers reported an unexplained explosion at the de Havilland factory.
27:14As far as the Germans are concerned, this new agent of theirs, Mr. Chapman, is now the great star of
27:24the German intelligence service.
27:27But he had been conning German intelligence from the very start.
27:33For Chapman, the idea of being able to get out of jail, well, he'll do anything, won't he?
27:40And as soon as he gets on the ground, as soon as he has a chance, he tells British counterintelligence
27:49what he is up to.
27:51So in order to build his credibility, the British armed forces simulate the destruction of the de Havilland factory.
28:05They arranged the fake sabotage of the airplane plant using an illusionist and a planted story in the newspaper.
28:15Nazi intelligence bought the lie.
28:18Chapman returned to Germany under the guise of having pulled off a successful attack.
28:23He was rewarded with a massive payment and given the Iron Cross, the only British citizen to ever get one.
28:33Believing he was their best agent, he was soon tasked with a new mission.
28:38Chapman was parachuted again into Britain in June of 1944 to report on the accuracy of the V-1 and
28:45V-2 rockets being fired across the channel.
28:48He tells his British controllers what the job is, and British counterintelligence calculate exactly how wrong they want the German
29:02aim to be.
29:04Chapman was one of the most successful double agents of the entire war.
29:08He remained in London and was dismissed by British intelligence in November 1944.
29:16But the French prison he left behind had been transformed after a brave struggle against Nazi occupation erupted across the
29:26country.
29:27Resistance was growing, and it would eventually lead back to the camp at Fort Romanville.
29:36In 1944, Fort Romanville in France was operating as a Nazi prison camp.
29:44Holding heroic female resistance fighters determined to stand up against the terrors of the Third Reich.
29:52Fort Romanville became a departure point for deportation specifically for women to the Nazi concentration camp system.
30:02Before they left, they were held in the fort's dank casemates.
30:08I'm always deeply moved whenever I enter casemate 17.
30:13The inmates, before heading into the unknown, wish to leave their name, a date, a trace of their passage, like
30:19a message in a bottle.
30:22These are the last records many of these people would leave behind.
30:27Throughout the war, more than 3,800 women were detained here, before being sent to Nazi concentration camps.
30:36Fort Romanville was finally liberated by the Allies in August 1944, and was abandoned by the French military in the
30:46early 2000s.
30:49After his dismissal by British intelligence, Eddie Chapman continued living life on his own terms.
30:56Spending his time in the company of beautiful women, and even becoming embroiled in a gold smuggling operation.
31:05Since 1945, Parisians have held ceremonies here to remember those imprisoned and deported from Romanville.
31:16Plans are underway to transform parts of the fort into a museum.
31:24It's a place that is doubly moving as a historian and as a human being.
31:30It's truly important to preserve these sites, to understand what transpired, and to pass on that knowledge.
31:42In the city of brotherly love is a faded landmark, once the life and soul of an uptown district.
31:55We're on the north side of Philadelphia, on a busy road flanked by offices and shops.
32:01One building along this strip stands out, and it looks like it's from a different era.
32:07From its design, with its ornate brickwork and detailed carvings, you can tell that this was a building of importance
32:14to the surrounding community.
32:15There remains part of a marquee with the words Uptown written on it. This was clearly some type of theatre
32:23or music venue.
32:26Inside, the true extent of its ruin becomes clear.
32:31In the main room, there's a dramatic sight. A gaping hole in the roof lets in enough light to illuminate
32:37a huge open space.
32:39This may look forgotten now, but in its heyday, this was part of a network that spanned the whole of
32:46the East Coast and fostered some of the greatest entertainers of the 20th century.
32:52Ray Charles, James Brown, Jackson 5, this place played host to the who's who of American icons.
32:59But this wasn't just a place for entertainment. It was also a place for activism.
33:08Wow. I haven't been here since the 70s. It's amazing.
33:15My mom worked here as a cashier. I wasn't allowed in the booth because she was handling money.
33:23Starting when she was 14 years old, Olivia Riley spent many of her evenings and weekends in this theatre.
33:30I was kind of famous because everybody knew she was my mother.
33:36They kind of hung around me because they can get in for free.
33:42There was a lot of excitement because you were looking forward to seeing all the acts.
33:48They were all up and coming and famous artists.
33:52From its earliest days, this was the cultural heart of the neighbourhood.
33:57It was built in the late 1920s, an era of rapid expansion in the city.
34:05Philadelphia was one of the most important manufacturing centres in the world.
34:10Factories and warehouses dotted this area and soon neighbourhoods of row homes were built in order to accommodate the workers.
34:17As newcomers poured in, there was an increase in demand for entertainment venues.
34:23On February 16th, 1929, Warner Brothers opened the lavish 2,000 seat uptown theatre.
34:31They spared no expense. It had terracotta façades, stained glass windows and velvet seats.
34:38This was a luxurious way to watch movies for everyone, from the city's wealthy industrialists to working class families.
34:48On its opening night, crowds flocked to see On Trial, starring Pauline Frederick.
34:55It was the perfect choice to showcase the uptown's cutting-edge design.
35:02Hollywood was riding high on the success of silent films, and the Warner Brothers studio decided to take a gamble
35:09on a revolutionary new development, speaking films known as talkies.
35:15This theatre was specifically wired for sound. The audio quality here was second to none.
35:22It seemed destined for success. But just eight months after it opened, the country was struck by disaster.
35:30The Wall Street Crash.
35:34This recession resulted in the collapse of most of Philadelphia's manufacturing industry.
35:41And over the next few decades, many of its residents fled to the suburbs.
35:45But a change was coming to this neighbourhood that would give it a second life and a brush with stardom.
35:57In the early 1950s, Philadelphia's uptown theatre was down on its luck.
36:04But its fortunes were about to change.
36:08By this time, with migration from southern states, North Philadelphia had become a vibrant hub of African-American culture and
36:16arts.
36:17In 1952, theatre mogul Samuel H. Stiefel bought the uptown with plans to completely repurpose it.
36:27It had incredible acoustics left over from its days as a movie theatre.
36:31And Stiefel saw an opportunity to put it to new use as a music venue.
36:35But the uptown theatre wasn't the only one of its kind.
36:40Rather, it was part of a circuit that stretched across the entire East Coast.
36:44Along with the Apollo in New York, and the Howard Theatre in Washington, D.C., and the Regal in Chicago,
36:52and many others, this made up what was called the Chitlin circuit.
36:56Because of racism, African-American acts couldn't perform in certain areas, so they would do the Chitlin circuit.
37:04The Chitlin circuit gave so many black entertainers a chance during the era of Jim Crow when they were barred
37:12from white mainstream venues.
37:14This stage would play host to some of the era's most legendary black performers.
37:20I saw every show at least two times. I didn't miss a show.
37:26I saw the Jackson 5, James Brown, the Harold Melvin, and the Blue Notes, and Marvin Gaye. I saw him
37:34so many times.
37:36But my favorite was the Isley Brothers, because I was a part of history.
37:43At the end of their act, they just started singing Shout. And every time they sang Shout, they'd jump. Everybody
37:52in the audience jumped. It was electrifying.
37:56Ron Isley created that song that night that I was here.
38:00These acts would come for a few days or even a week playing shows around the clock for a ticket
38:06price as low as 50 cents.
38:08That's still only a little more than five bucks in today's money.
38:12On Saturdays, sometimes they'd even do five or six shows back to back.
38:19Tens of thousands of people came through this auditorium in the 1960s.
38:24And the theater gained a reputation as one of the country's most iconic venues.
38:30If there was one man responsible for a lot of the uptown success, it was the promoter, Georgie Woods.
38:36He had a nice voice. He had a beautiful personality. And he captured a lot of people's attention.
38:45He drew a big crowd. So they made him the MC.
38:50He was known for bringing in incredible performers at incredibly low prices.
38:55It was reported that he got the Supremes to play for 10 days for $400.
39:02But Woods was not just a DJ, MC, and promoter.
39:06He was a passionate advocate for civil rights.
39:10In 1963, he helped charter 21 buses to take Philadelphians to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s historic march on Washington.
39:22That same year, he would use the uptown to support the cause.
39:28Georgie Woods saw the uptown theater not just as an entertainment venue, but as a vehicle for change.
39:35Woods began organizing what he called freedom shows, fundraisers for civil rights organizations right across the country.
39:43These star-studded concerts provided much-needed funds for charities and civil rights organizations.
39:50And Woods' contribution to the movement was soon recognized on the stage where it all began.
39:57He was even honored by the NAACP in a ceremony held right here at the uptown.
40:04But the success of the civil rights movement in ending segregation across the country would have unintended consequences for the
40:13uptown theater.
40:16Some say that after integration, when Black performers could go to more venues, the importance of places like this on
40:24the Chitlin circuit declined.
40:28In 1972, Georgie Woods stopped producing shows here.
40:33And as many residents left for the suburbs over the following years, its fate was sealed.
40:39It closed because of the neighborhood changing.
40:44I think that's what really happened.
40:48The uptown theater finally shut its doors in 1978.
40:55In 2001, the Uptown Entertainment and Development Corporation purchased the building.
41:04They now hope to breathe new life into this aging structure.
41:10The plans is to get the uptown renovated, restored for the community.
41:16A lot of things happen here.
41:18The performers, they couldn't have made it unless they made it here at the uptown.
41:23And everybody remembers coming here.
41:26So, it should be open.
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