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More than two decades have passed since a Los Angeles jury found O.J. Simpson not guilty in the murder of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman. But the new series “American Crime Story: The People Vs. O.J. Simpson” demonstrates that the race and class issues raised by the case still resonate today.
Anthony Hemingway is co-executive producer of the series and directed a number of episodes. As he tells The Takeaway, the Simpson case “really highlighted race and privilege in America…we know that the justice system really favors rich white people, mostly men. And this was the first time, and really the only time, that a black man beat the system.”
Hemingway was just 19-years-old during the Simpson trial, and, growing up in a black community, he remembers O.J. as someone who “was a hero and a pillar in the community. I think we looked past whether he was guilty or not. It was really just about…here’s someone like me that actually won.”
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