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Valley native makes mark as documentarian
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IN TUNE: Derrick Jones, also a rapper, performed his first concert at home during VexFest on Aug. 17 in downtown Youngstown.
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FOCUSED: Youngstown native Derrick Jones follows his passion for filmmaking with a documentary about inmates accused of murder during a riot at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility in Lucasville. He has been awarded a prestigious grant for his work.
By SHELBY SCHROEDER
Princess Grace Foundation awarded Derrick Jones a $20,000 grant.
YOUNGSTOWN — Derrick Jones is headed north, from the campus of Ohio University to Toledo, to meet again with the wife of a death row inmate.
It’s one of the many conversations Jones, 30, will have during the course of his film.
With two college degrees to hang on the wall — what he modestly refers to as “pieces of paper” — Jones is now following his passion for filmmaking with a documentary on the Lucasville Five, the story of inmates accused of murder during a riot in the small Ohio town.
People are excited to see his work. After PBS offered its airwaves to Jones for his completed film, the prestigious Princess Grace Foundation awarded him a $20,000 grant to help with production costs.
Coming up with the idea for the film, which will serve as his thesis at OU, was simple. Like everything in Jones’ life, the story was another role he’d been cast to take part in.
His long-time thespian mother, Joyce A. Jones, performed in a play about the Lucasville Five that toured through cities around the state. It was after she and other actors from the Youngstown Playhouse performed at Ohio University that Derrick was drawn to it.
“The idea of fair trials and criminal justice systems interests me,” Derrick Jones said.
His mother could tell. “As soon as he saw it,” she said, “he knew he had to make a documentary on it.”
Friends and family describe him as caring, giving, funny and talented, though he considers himself an “introverted extrovert.” Of his talents — acting, poetry, and rapping — he says directing documentaries suits him well because, “It’s something an introverted person can do.”
Many times with documentaries, it’s just him and a camera, he said; and that’s how he likes it.
Being a documentarian is just one part of who he is. “After a while, I started to realize that everyone has their part to play, whether they realize it or not,” he said. “I’m where I am because of the role I’ve been put in.”
Jones has a winding history, beginning as a child growing up on the South Side with his parents, younger brother, and later a sister. He could see the city changing from the Ridge Avenue home that his parents, and grandparents before them, had owned.
“Growing up wasn’t always rough,” Jones said. “When I grew up, people were still fighting, not shooting.”
But things could have turned out differently for Jones, he said, if not for his parents who involved him with the arts early on.
“He was at the playhouse from age 10 until he left for college,” Joyce said. The playhouse stage is where Derrick got the acting bug, his mother said.
An interest in filmmaking developed simultaneously, which came as a surprise to his father, Dennis Jones. His earliest memory of Derrick’s interest in movies was of a young boy thrilled to play with his Scooby Doo projector.
“He seemed to get a kick out of it,” Dennis Jones said. “He must have been only 5.”
The Jones family invested in a camcorder once they became affordable, filming everything from proms to graduations and homecomings. With the family video camera came one of Derrick’s first pieces: a film for his sister Nikita’s graduation party.
With footage and photos, Derrick crafted a video of his sister growing up. Joyce laughs at the thought of the film.
“He actually wrote a skit where Nikita is interviewing herself,” said Joyce, explaining that her daughter playfully acted, per the script, as a snob in the video.
While watching the film, Joyce recalled, “I was standing there thinking, ‘Wow, this is my son!’”
From the drawing boards to production and editing, Derrick said he always tries to give a part of himself to a piece.
“One big thing is to tackle the personal ... to make sure you have that connection to [the film], and that it represents you fully.”
Ammar Mufleh has been impressed with Derrick’s personal touch for more than a decade.
“Whether you read his poetry or watch his film, he’s able to capture real life experience,” Mufleh said. “He sees film as a thread that ties people together.”
Derrick met Mufleh as an undergraduate at Bowling Green State University, in northwest Ohio. Soon after, Mufleh became Derrick’s mentor in a campus fraternity.
Now BGSU alumni living in separate states, the two speak to each other at least once a week by phone, and visiting as often as possible.
Derrick still refers to Mufleh as his mentor.
Part of Derrick’s draw, Mufleh and other friends say, is that he’s open to befriending anyone.
“He knows how to break barriers with people,” friend Susan Hilvert said. “He’s like a magnet; he’s got something that attracts so many people.”
For that he credits his belief that a better world can come only through understanding the lives of others.
“I don’t eliminate contact with people just because I’m on a different path,” he said. That’s how he sustains relationships with people in his past, and new people he encounters, he said.
In October, Derrick will be taking his mother to a black-tie gala in New York City where he will accept his Princess Grace Award — a very proud, if not unbelievable, moment for him.
“My family doesn’t really get to see a lot of my successes, and in a way, I credit [my mother] for inadvertently pushing me in this direction.”
Joyce is thrilled to go — for her son’s achievement, her planned attire, and the chance to meet the son of the late Princess Grace.
“I’m going to meet the Prince of Monaco!”
Mufleh says he plans to premier Derrick’s film in a theater he owns in Bowling Green, as a token of their friendship and support for Derrick’s talent.
sschroeder@vindy.com