Steve Holland film to screen as part of University of Mississippi SouthTalks series
By Rebecca Lauck Cleary
Former Mississippi Rep. Steve Holland gained notoriety as a colorful character during his 36-year career in the Mississippi Legislature, and he recently returned to the spotlight as one of the central characters in the Netflix series The Kings of Tupelo.
But Holland’s first brush with cinematic immortality actually came in 2023 with the release of Jesus Was a Democrat, a 30-minute documentary that reflects on life and loss by following Holland as he clears out his office in the Capitol. The film will be screened at 4 pm, Thursday January 30 in Barnard Observatory as part of the Center for the Study of Southern Culture’s SouthTalks series.
The film was produced by Rex Jones, at the time a producer-director for the Southern Documentary Project at the University of Mississippi. Jones was in Jackson in 2020 to shoot a film about the legendary Sun-n-Sand Motor Inn at the same time Holland was moving out of his office. He realized it would be history in the making as three decades of legislative knowledge walked out with Holland.
“It was a golden opportunity for me and Steve is so interesting on his own, he deserves his own film,” Jones said. “After we toured the vacant Sun-n-Sand, we went to the Capitol and I recorded him moving all his stuff out. It was a great experience, a real privileged moment.”
Holland and Jones, an assistant professor of communication at Mississippi State University, will return to Ole Miss for the screening. Afterward, Katie McKee, director of the Center for the Study of Southern Culture, will discuss with Holland his careers as a politician and funeral home operator.
The event is free and open to the public.
“Long a figure larger than life in both Mississippi politics and the funeral home business, raconteur Steve Holland courts the camera like a pro in both this film and the more recently released Kings of Tupelo, touching on universal themes in intensely local settings,” McKee said.
Holland, who lives in Plantersville, is a Democrat turned Independent who represented the 16th District from 1983 to 2019. He is president of Holland Funeral Directors, the Tupelo business he co-owned with his mother, former Lee County Judge Sadie Holland, until her death in 2020.
He frequently made the news for his colorful speeches on the floor of the state House of Representatives and for bills he introduced. He helped pass legislation supporting organ donation in Mississippi and was responsible for crafting the bill that enshrined the teddy bear as the state toy.
In 2012, Holland submitted a bill to rename the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America” as a way of poking fun at what he saw as misplaced priorities of some politicians.
Jones contacted Holland for his film about the Sun-n-Sand, a fixture of downtown Jackson near the Capitol from its opening in 1960. The motel was shuttered in 2001 and partially demolished in 2021.
According to lore, more legislation was passed at the Sun-n-Sand than under the dome of the Capitol, so Holland had many stories to share.
As he watched the footage and saw Holland’s interactions with people and how emotional he was, Jones’ focus crystalized and Jesus Was a Democrat began to take shape. He knew that spotlighting the idiosyncrasies of Holland instead of offering a political retrospective would be a different approach for a film about a longtime legislator.
“It was a little risky, but Steve has the personality to pull it off, and I always try to wring out as much emotion as possible,” Jones said. “I started building the film around this loss he had suffered, this political defeat that had ended his legislative career, and this theme of loss came forward for me, and obviously, professionally, Steve deals with loss every day.
“I wondered if I could make a political movie without having much politics in it, and it’s really a character study of a man who happened to be a politician for 36 years. I tried to capture the spirit of Steve Holland, which is this incredible contradiction between the sacred and the profane, and he’s very sincere in both those regards.”
In the film, Holland says he believes that Jesus would be a Democrat because he redeems people instead of punishing them.
“People are messy, people are full of contradictions, but Steve Holland is absolutely genuine and sincere in his desire to help people and he really does live by that red letter part of the Bible, as he puts it, which are the words that Jesus spoke,” he said.
In a poignant part of the film, Holland says, “You know, I specialize in saying goodbyes and that’s the reason they don’t bother me so much,” as he loads the contents of his legislative office into his truck on a cold November night.
“He tries to put on a brave face and says he’s not sad, he’s thankful, but you can tell he is a little conflicted,” Jones said.
Jones is pleased because his profile of Holland will be part of the historical record.
“It underscored the mission of the Southern Documentary Project, which is we are beholden to get these stories before there’s not a chance to get them anymore, and that’s why the work is so important,” he said.
“People come and go and nothing lasts forever, but I feel good that my body of work, including this Steve Holland film, will have some sort of lasting legacy.”
