Southern Cultural Heritage Foundation
Southern Cultural Heritage Center
Vicksburg · Group rates · 601-631-2997
Guided group tours of the five convent buildings, the 1885 auditorium of the Hoedown among them. Book ahead.
Read moreNoticeMississippi, 1937 · filmed summer 1999
O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Three men off a chain gang, loose in a green summer that was graded to gold in a computer. Take the brush, drain the green, then go and find where it still grows.
Where this comes from
Behind the notice: the railroad station at Edwards, Mississippi, photographed by Walker Evans in 1936 (public domain). In the film, the blind handcar driver leaves down this line.
Cinesite, Hollywood · after the shoot
Drain the green.Mississippi was green that summer. The film is not. Pick a place where the green still grows and do the grade yourself.
Texas was the first choice. The film is shot instead at practical locations in Mississippi, in and around Jackson, in a summer when the crew is rained out only once.
Where this comes from
D’Lo, the river rocks: still green.
0% drained
- The test Test footage is shot in Griffith Park, where the trees are as green as Mississippi’s.
- The suite At Cinesite in Hollywood, Deakins and Julius Friede turn the greens of trees and grass into dry browns and yellows. Deakins spends about ten weeks in the digital suite.
- The look Deakins wanted the feel of an old, faded postcard and to get rid of the greens, but not a traditional sepia.
- The first /Film calls it the first Hollywood film colour-timed entirely through a digital intermediate. Deakins says the process took over eleven weeks.
A county park on the Strong River with cabins, camping, canoes and tubes. Wade in the shallows; watch your footing on the rocks.
Where this comes from
Homer, on Mississippi roads
Homer’s frieze.The Coens’ film of three escaped convicts in Depression-era Mississippi is loosely based on Homer’s Odyssey. Fire a panel to find where its scene was really shot.
Three panels, still black on clay.
Where this comes from
Four tins on a shelf
The tins.Pomade tins went into the flood tank with a banjo and a gramophone horn. Twist off a lid and a place on the road falls out.
Four tins, lids on.
Where this comes from
1302 Adams Street, Vicksburg
Hang the lamps.The Hoedown was shot in an 1885 auditorium with a very low ceiling. Light it the way Roger Deakins did.
0 of 65 Tweenies
A dark stage under a low ceiling.
The Homer Stokes Hoedown is filmed in the 1885 auditorium in Vicksburg. Under the theatre’s very low ceiling, Deakins hangs 65 Tweenies to give the stage a soft glow.
- Part of the film was shot in the auditorium, which dates from 1885 and holds up to 400 people.
- The centre is five buildings: the Cobb House of about 1830, the Sisters of Mercy convent of 1868, the 1885 auditorium, the 1937 academy and the 1955 gymnasium.
A working cultural centre in old convent buildings. Book a guided group tour ahead: 601-631-2997.
Where this comes from
Nashville
Down from the mountain.The musicians on the soundtrack took the songs to the Ryman, and a film crew followed.
Down From The Mountain, a 2001 documentary by Nick Doob, Chris Hegedus and D A Pennebaker, records a concert here by the musicians on the film’s soundtrack.
T Bone Burnett, who produced the soundtrack, asked Bob Neuwirth to put the film crew together.
On stage were Emmylou Harris, Alison Krauss and Union Station, Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, the Cox Family, the Fairfield Four, the Whites, Chris Thomas King, Colin Linden, John Hartford and Ralph Stanley.
Daytime tours run daily, 9am to 4pm: self-guided $25, guided backstage $42.52. Evening shows most nights.
Where this comes from
Ryman Auditorium
Ryman Auditorium tours
Nashville · Self-guided $25 · backstage $42.52 · VIP $62.02
Walk the hall where the soundtrack’s musicians played Down From The Mountain. Self-guided, guided backstage or VIP, daily 9am to 4pm.
Book a tour
The Ryman
Where it all is now.The gold was made in Hollywood. The green is still in Mississippi.
Where this comes from
Where it is now
10 places you can visit, from Canton’s square to the Ryman. The radio station at Valley Park was a set and is gone; the backlot is seen from the tram.
Pins mark public places; private homes are named but not pinned.
General reference · Public access · Coordinate precision: site · Not an exact scene or camera position; not a visitor route. A working town square of nineteenth-century shopfronts. The Canton Museum of History is $5; the visitors bureau is at 147 North Union Street.
General reference · Public access · Coordinate precision: site · Not an exact scene or camera position; not a visitor route. A county park on the Strong River with cabins, camping, canoes and tubes. Wade in the shallows; watch your footing on the rocks.
General reference · Public access · Coordinate precision: site · Not an exact scene or camera position; not a visitor route. A small town on the old railroad between Jackson and Vicksburg. Look from the street; stay off the tracks.
Courthouse Square, Canton, Mississippi, 2014. CapCase · CC BY 2.0 West Peace Street, Courthouse Square, Canton
Courthouse Square, Canton
Homer Stokes’s political rally, where Everett spots his daughters, was filmed on the south side of the square, on West Peace Street.
A working town square of nineteenth-century shopfronts. The Canton Museum of History is $5; the visitors bureau is at 147 North Union Street.
Where this comes from
The rocks and rapids on the Strong River at D'Lo Water Park, summer 2010. Quinn Rossi · CC BY 2.0 135 D’Lo Park Road, D’Lo, Simpson County
D’Lo Water Park
The sirens scene was filmed here, where the three women sing and Pete is turned into a horny toad.
A county park on the Strong River with cabins, camping, canoes and tubes. Wade in the shallows; watch your footing on the rocks.
Where this comes from
The railroad station at Edwards, Mississippi, photographed by Walker Evans in 1936. Walker Evans · Public domain Front Street at South Main Street, Edwards
The railroad at Edwards
The blind handcar driver leaves on the track at the Kansas City Southern Railway crossing, Front Street at South Main Street.
A small town on the old railroad between Jackson and Vicksburg. Look from the street; stay off the tracks.
Where this comes from
Stay
A Main Street balcony, a cabin by the rocks.
The Main Street Hotel in Yazoo City, and cabins and camping at D’Lo Water Park.
Main Street Hotel, Yazoo City
The Main Street Hotel
Yazoo City · Rates on booking · 662-751-8886 · 10% off for AARP and AAA members
Rooms on the floor above South Main Street, each with a balcony over the street, a sitting area and claw-foot tubs; some suites have kitchens. A few doors from the old bank and the Woolworth store. 203 South Main Street.
See the hotel
Simpson County Park Commission
Cabins and camping at D’Lo
D’Lo · Rates from the park office · 135 D’Lo Park Road
Rental cabins, RV hook-ups and tent sites at D’Lo Water Park, on the Strong River beside the sirens’ rocks, with canoes and tubes.
Plan a stayGo there
The Ryman, the backlot, the convent.
Tours of the Ryman, the Universal Studio Tour, the Southern Cultural Heritage Center, and tours round Jackson.
Ryman Auditorium
Ryman Auditorium tours
Nashville · Self-guided $25 · backstage $42.52 · VIP $62.02
Walk the hall where the soundtrack’s musicians played Down From The Mountain. Self-guided, guided backstage or VIP, daily 9am to 4pm.
Book a tour
Universal Studios Hollywood
The Studio Tour
Universal City, Los Angeles · Included with park admission
About an hour by tram through the working backlot and soundstages where the flood and the underwater scenes were made.
Plan a visitSouthern Cultural Heritage Foundation
Southern Cultural Heritage Center
Vicksburg · Group rates · 601-631-2997
Guided group tours of the five convent buildings, the 1885 auditorium of the Hoedown among them. Book ahead.
Read more
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Tours round Jackson, Mississippi
Jackson
Live marketplace results for tours round Jackson. None is an O Brother tour as such: check each itinerary.
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A flea market on the square, a haunted hall.
The Canton Flea Market on the square, and the Ryman’s Haunted History tour on Halloween.
Checking current event dates…
Take it home
The script, the poem, the music.
The Faber screenplay, Homer in the Fagles translation, Adam Nayman’s Coen book and the soundtrack. Our store has no original poster for this film.
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O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Ethan Coen and Joel Coen
The screenplay, published by Faber and Faber in 2000.
Find the book
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The Odyssey
Homer, translated by Robert Fagles
Homer’s poem in the Penguin Classics translation by Robert Fagles: the story the film borrows from.
Find the book
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The Coen Brothers: This Book Really Ties the Films Together
Adam Nayman
Adam Nayman’s 2018 book on every Coen film.
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O Brother, Where Art Thou? Music From a Film by Joel Coen & Ethan Coen
Various artists, produced by T Bone Burnett · Enhanced CD, Lost Highway / Mercury, 2000
The soundtrack, released in the US on 5 December 2000.
Live marketplace search · listings and condition change
Find a copyDates, prices, rooms and stock change: confirm with the provider before you travel or buy. A stay or tour is described as a filming location only where the card says so.
Go in summer. The green is still there.
Where this comes from
Every place and moment behind this page, with sources.
10 of 10 places · 18 of 18 Moments
Courthouse Square, Canton
West Peace Street, Courthouse Square, Canton
Three escapees
George Clooney plays Everett Ulysses McGill, with John Turturro and Tim Blake Nelson as the convicts who escape with him, and Holly Hunter as his ex-wife.
Mississippi, not Texas
Texas was the first choice. The film is shot instead at practical locations in Mississippi, in and around Jackson, in a summer when the crew is rained out only once.
The rally on the square
Homer Stokes holds his rally on Canton’s Courthouse Square, and Everett spots his daughters.
D’Lo Water Park
135 D’Lo Park Road, D’Lo, Simpson County
Loosely Homer
The Coens’ film of three escaped convicts in Depression-era Mississippi is loosely based on Homer’s Odyssey.
The sirens
Three women sing in the river at D’Lo, and Pete is turned into a horny toad.
The railroad at Edwards
Front Street at South Main Street, Edwards
Off down the line
The blind handcar driver leaves on the track at the railway crossing in Edwards.
Southern Cultural Heritage Center, Vicksburg
1302 Adams Street, Vicksburg
The Hoedown
The Homer Stokes Hoedown is filmed in the 1885 auditorium in Vicksburg.
Sixty-five lamps
Under the theatre’s very low ceiling, Deakins hangs 65 Tweenies to give the stage a soft glow.
Valley Park, the WEZY site
Valley Park, west of US Highway 61, Issaquena County
WEZY
The radio station where the Soggy Bottom Boys cut their record is built for the film at Valley Park and taken down afterwards.
South Main Street, Yazoo City
South Main Street, Yazoo City
Itta Bena
The bank robbery the film sets in Itta Bena is shot at the Bank of Yazoo City.
Penny at Woolworth
Everett finds Penny at a Woolworth store, played by the old Saxton Hardware at 128 South Main Street.
Leland
Leland, Washington County
The blind seer
The blind man on the handcar tells the trio’s future. The scene is filmed in Leland.
Ryman Auditorium
116 Rep. John Lewis Way North, Nashville
Down from the mountain
The soundtrack’s musicians play the Ryman for a concert filmed as Down From The Mountain, at T Bone Burnett’s instigation.
Universal Studios Hollywood backlot
100 Universal City Plaza, Universal City, Los Angeles
The flood
The flood, the underwater shots and the coffin are filmed at Universal, on the backlot and in the tank.
Griffith Park
Griffith Park, Los Angeles
Green enough
Test footage is shot in Griffith Park, where the trees are as green as Mississippi’s.
Draining the green
At Cinesite in Hollywood, Deakins and Julius Friede turn the greens of trees and grass into dry browns and yellows. Deakins spends about ten weeks in the digital suite.
The first all-digital grade
/Film calls it the first Hollywood film colour-timed entirely through a digital intermediate. Deakins says the process took over eleven weeks.
An old postcard
Deakins wanted the feel of an old, faded postcard and to get rid of the greens, but not a traditional sepia.