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Photo by Jacob Coppage
Dietrich Teschner as Jesse James, photographed in Petersburg
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Photo by Jacob Coppage
Hays Wellford as young Davy Crockett.
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Photo by Jacob Coppage
Director Kevin Hershberger
Kevin Hershberger doesn’t need to live in Los Angeles to have a career in filmmaking. His western Henrico County-based company, LionHeart FilmWorks, has established such a successful niche that clients are seeking him out for projects, including a new 10-week series that airs on the Fox News Channel starting April 12, Legends & Lies: Into the West.
Beginning with back-to-back episodes on Jesse James and Doc Holliday, the series will focus on a different Wild West character each week, showing a recreation of events for which the person is famous, along with interviews of descendents and historians. The intention is for viewers to be able to decide for themselves what is true and what isn’t.
Bill O’Reilly, host of The O’Reilly Factor on Fox News (and co-author of the book Killing Kennedy, made into a TV movie that was filmed in Richmond), is the executive producer of the series, which is produced by Montana-based Warm Springs Productions — the team behind such reality shows as The History Channel’s Mountain Men.
“I was lucky enough to get a call from [Warm Springs],” Hershberger says. A producer of historical footage and documentaries on various topics — some of which can be found on the shelves at Walmart — he also recently worked on filming The American Revolution series for Discovery’s American Heroes Channel. He has a network of actors to call on, and he knows where to find a vintage car or an old radio. He also designs and rents out period costumes to other productions, such as AMC’s Turn or the Meg Ryan-directed Ithaca. “Our interest, our hobby, our passion is historical projects,” he says.
Hershberger directs the Legends & Lies series and serves as a producer and the costume designer. He’s responsible for filming the legendary events that make up the majority of the shows; interviews with historians and descendents were done by other contracted filmmakers. “We started with 400 pages of history,” he says. “It’s the biggest project [yet] for my company.”
Shooting started in October and continued through early March. Though some scenes were done in Texas and Arizona, the bulk of the filming happened in and around Richmond: at the former James River Correctional Center property in Goochland County, at Henrico’s Meadow Farm, at Powhatan State Park and in Petersburg.
Among the local actors to watch for are Dietrich Teschner as Jesse James; Morgan Stone as James’ mother, Zerelda; Hays Wellford and Armistead Wellford playing Davy Crockett at different ages; Michael Marunde as Kit Carson and D.L. Hopkins as Bass Reeves, who may have been the inspiration for The Lone Ranger hero of radio, TV, comics and movies. Said to be the first black U.S. marshal west of the Mississippi, Reeves arrested more than 3,000 outlaws during his 32-year career ending in 1907.
“What you see and hear about in respect to The Lone Ranger is only a fraction of what this man did,” Hopkins says.
Hershberger grew up in Baltimore and attended Virginia Military Institute; he served in the Virginia Army National Guard during and after college, and in the Army as a military intelligence officer. He’s lived in the Richmond area since 2001. For someone who specializes in historical filmmaking, it’s the perfect place, he says. “Everything I need is here.”
