Prisoner turned actor Clarence Maclin on life inside Sing Sing – and starring in a film based on it

New film Sing Sing opens with recent Oscar nominee Colman Domingo reciting lines from A Midsummer Night’s Dream. It’s the first clue that this is a prison movie like no other. Domingo plays John ‘Divine G’ Whitfield, an inmate at the upstate New York maximum security prison that shares its name with the film. 

Everything about this story of brotherhood, creativity and survival feels real. The locations, many of the actors, and the story that follows wrongly imprisoned Divine G are as real and authentic as drama gets. Divine G is a mainstay of the theatre programme inside the Sing Sing prison, and his friendship with Divine Eye – one of the most feared inmates who finds a new direction via performing – makes a compelling case for the arts as a rehabilitation tool.  

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As you would expect, Sing Sing is a tough environment. The US criminal justice system always is – particularly if you are Black, or poor, or both. But it also has a forward-thinking Rehabilitation Through The Arts (RTA) programme, established by Katherine Vockins in 1996, which offers inmates theatre workshops that have produced tangible real-life impacts.  

Starring alongside Domingo is Clarence ‘Divine Eye’ Maclin. Maclin is playing himself – revisiting his time in jail and a life-changing journey that began with him stumbling across his peers, mid-performance in the Sing Sing chapel. What he saw that day, and the bond he would form with Divine G changed him profoundly.  

“Seeing the brothers up there creating, being able to step outside of who they normally were every day in the yard and put on different clothes and become different people? Man, it was a beautiful thing to see,” says Maclin, via a video call from his home. “I wanted to be a part of that. Because I was artistic as a child. I used to draw, paint, create with my hands and I had suppressed all that.” 

Maclin was able to draw on his experiences to produce a performance of such magnetism in the film that he holds his own alongside Domingo’s acting prowess.  

“Meeting Colman was a true blessing. He’s such an open guy and such a creative soul,” says Maclin.  

“When you put that kind of creativity in a room with other like-minded individuals it becomes this a beautiful thing. He was immediately a kindred spirit. We would finish each other’s sentences, we shared a creative brotherhood. And that is so beautiful. If you catch a glimpse of Colman you’d swear it is Divine G in terms of his mannerisms.” 

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Change did not happen overnight. But seeing familiar faces expressing unfamiliar emotions, channeling their feelings in creative ways stirred something in Maclin.  

“I was a bit standoffish at first,” he says. “They were different guys outside of this room and I didn’t understand why at the time. But this was a safe place to be. You could let your guard down in here. I didn’t appreciate it until I became the guy who had to take the mask off, the guy who had to become himself.” 

Filmmaker Greg Kwedar, who directs Sing Sing alongside his creative partner Clint Bentley, was shooting a documentary in a maximum-security prison in Wichita, Kansas, when he saw a man in his cell looking after a rescue dog. That triggered an exploration of the ways prisons were doing things differently. And he soon landed on RTA, which was putting on plays at Sing Sing. 

In the film, Divine Eye speaks up for the idea of producing an original comedy, rather than another Shakespearian tragedy. “Every day we are dealing with trauma and drama, every day we got tragedy. I think the population just might appreciate a comedy,” he argues.  

“They’d done all the classic plays,” says writer-director Kwedar. “But one of the only originals was a time-travelling musical comedy called Breakin’ The Mummy’s Code.  

“I was so struck by the tone of this madcap comedy and the joy juxtaposed against such a dark environment. I knew if we could capture that and put it in a movie we’d have something special.” 

Breakin’ The Mummy’s Code, had been written by actor and playwright Brent Buell, who was volunteering with RTA. Kwedar and Bentley began volunteering themselves.  

“Becoming teachers on the program was a transformational process for us,” says Kwedar.  

“We travelled through all those gates into this beautiful, warm classroom of human beings who had no masks on, who so intensely desired connection. It felt like a secret that had been kept from the world. We’re all aware that prison is not a place anyone wants to spend any time in. But what the world doesn’t know is this magical, transformative process that can unfold through reconnecting with the artists inside us. 

“And the results are staggering. We are the most incarcerated country in the world. The recidivism rate of people returning to prison within five years of release is over 60% in our country. But less than 3% of graduates of this RTA programme ever go back inside.” 

When Clarence Maclin went back inside, it was on his own terms. To film a starring role he hopes will be as life-changing as his first encounter with RTA.  

“The most identifiable part of being a convicted prisoner is the uniform,” he says. “So I was very apprehensive about putting that back on and stepping back into prisons that I was in during my incarceration. But the purpose of what we were doing outweighed the apprehension. 

“The film demonstrates what the possibilities are. There are tremendous possibilities if we focus on programming and therapy rather than punishment.” 

Sing Sing is in cinemas from 30 August.  

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