Crossroads of America: Oklahoma’s Route 66 screening

Migration, road trips and the making of a route

The documentary follows Route 66 in Oklahoma through several distinct eras: families moving west during the Dust Bowl, the hardships surrounding that migration, and the postwar years when the highway carried travelers on road trips. Its account also reaches back to Cy Avery’s vision of placing Oklahoma at the center of Route 66.

That sweep makes the road more than a line on a map. The film’s account connects the movement of families and later travelers with the growth of small-town enterprise along the route.

Further reading: Crossroads of America: Oklahoma's Route 66 screening | OHS Calendar ↗ · About | Explore, Celebrate, Preserve the Road — Crossroads of America: Oklahoma’s Route 66 ↗

Two Oklahoma figures in the road’s story

The project connects the highway’s public history to Will Rogers and Woody Guthrie. Its description associates Rogers with the humor and optimism of the open road, and Guthrie with people pursuing a better life along it. Their presence broadens the film’s focus from travel itself to the people and aspirations carried by the route.

Further reading: About | Explore, Celebrate, Preserve the Road — Crossroads of America: Oklahoma’s Route 66 ↗

The present is part of the history

The film’s centennial perspective also turns to people working along Route 66 now. Restaurateurs, artists, preservationists and community leaders are among the groups named in the project description—not as a separate epilogue, but as people whose work will influence what the road becomes next.

That emphasis gives the historical material a practical connection to the present: the film looks at a route shaped both by earlier generations and by the communities continuing to live and work beside it.

Further reading: About | Explore, Celebrate, Preserve the Road — Crossroads of America: Oklahoma’s Route 66 ↗ · Crossroads of America: Oklahoma’s Route 66 | A Documentary Film ↗

Interviews, local encounters and virtual production

The documentary combines interviews with historians and encounters with small-business owners. It also includes scenes made using virtual-production technology at Cherokee Film Studios, bringing a production method into a film otherwise grounded in the highway’s history and the people connected to it.

The film’s official site describes it as feature-length. The Miami screening listing does not provide a runtime or finish time.

Further reading: Crossroads of America: Oklahoma's Route 66 screening | OHS Calendar ↗ · Crossroads of America: Oklahoma’s Route 66 | A Documentary Film ↗

An Oklahoma-rooted production team

The Oklahoma Historical Society produced Crossroads of America: Oklahoma’s Route 66 in collaboration with director Bryan Beasley and producers Jon and Jaime Roman, with support from the Inasmuch Foundation. Beasley was raised in Oklahoma, studied at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and made his feature-documentary debut with Unconquered: Allan Houser and the Legacy of One Apache Family.

The Miami listing announces the screening but does not announce an appearance by the filmmakers.

Further reading: Crossroads of America: Oklahoma's Route 66 screening | OHS Calendar ↗ · About | Explore, Celebrate, Preserve the Road — Crossroads of America: Oklahoma’s Route 66 ↗

Other dates have different formats

The Miami date is a theater screening, not the film’s separate Oklahoma City author event. For Nov. 2, the film site lists doors at 5:30 p.m. at the Oklahoma History Center, a 6–7 p.m. book signing with Michael Wallis, Jim Ross and Shellee Graham, and a 7 p.m. screening.

The film site also lists a separate Tulsa Centennial Celebration on Nov. 11, with ticket details marked as forthcoming in the captured listing, and an OETA broadcast on Nov. 12 at 7 p.m. Those listings are not additional parts of the Miami program.

Further reading: Crossroads of America: Oklahoma's Route 66 screening | OHS Calendar ↗ · Crossroads of America: Oklahoma’s Route 66 | A Documentary Film ↗