Editing Wattstax (section)

==Festival production==

===Development===
Stax Record's West Coast director, Forrest Hamilton, came up with the idea for the Wattstax concert. Being in Los Angeles during the Watts Riots in 1965, Hamilton later became aware of the yearly Watts Summer Festival that commemorated the revolt.<ref name="RobGordonRespectYourselfWattstax" />

Hamilton contacted Stax Records' main offices in [[Memphis, Tennessee|Memphis, TN]] and shared his concept of a benefit-concert for the seventh Watts Summer Festival. At first, Stax was not so sure about putting together a small concert, with big stars, for a small community such as Watts. [[Tommy Jacquette]], the founder of the Watts Summer Festival, was contacted about the festival idea. With Jacquette being supportive, the concert idea was slowly developing into something larger.<ref name="RobGordonRespectYourselfWattstax" />

Stax president [[Al Bell]], who was very involved in planning the concert, decided that if the festival was going to be as big as he imagined, the festival could not just be held at a small park in Watts. It had to be held somewhere like the [[Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum]]. A team of several Stax directors, including Jacquette, contacted the L.A. Coliseum to schedule a meeting. When the meeting took place, the managers at the Coliseum were not convinced that "a little record company" from Memphis could sell enough tickets to fill the stadium.<ref name="RobGordonRespectYourselfWattstax" />

===Marketing===
Stax picked a date—August 20, 1972—which was [[Isaac Hayes]]'s 30th birthday and a few days after the seventh anniversary of the Watts Riots. The name of the concert—"Wattstax"—was formed to include "Watts", as in the neighborhood, and "Stax", the name of the record company putting the show together. All seats were reserved and priced at only one dollar each, as Stax wanted to make it possible for anyone to attend. Pre-sales were quite successful, easing concerns about the financial viability of the concert.<ref name="RobGordonRespectYourselfWattstax" />

===Construction===
The stage was built the day before the concert, with construction starting in the middle of the night and continuing into the morning. This conflict happened because a football game was scheduled on the night of August 19 between the [[Oakland Raiders]] and the [[Los Angeles Rams]], the home team for the Los Angeles Coliseum.<ref name="RobGordonRespectYourselfWattstax" /> Immediately after the football game, trucks full of long wood-planks drove onto the field. The stage was built right in the center of the field and was built high enough where artists could walk/sit under (a little less than 20 feet tall).<ref name="RobGordonRespectYourselfWattstax" />

A platform was built that led from the road (where artists would walk from) to the side stairs of the stage. The seats were hand-cleaned and trash was picked up all around the Coliseum. Also, due to the Coliseum's policy, there could be no seating on the field to prevent the grass being ruined for the Rams' next game on August 21.<ref name="AlBellCommentary">{{cite video|people=Bell,  Al |date=January 10, 2006 |title=''Wattstax'': Audio commentary with Al Bell, Isaac Hayes, et al |url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070902/ |medium=DVD |publisher=Warner Home Video |location=Burbank, CA |access-date=April 18, 2020 }}</ref> During the Wattstax concert in fact, an issue arose when much of the audience poured onto the field to dance while [[Rufus Thomas]] performed "[[Do the Funky Chicken]]". Stax executive Larry Shaw immediately asked Thomas to get the audience to return to the stands, leading to a memorable moment in the documentary film when one particular straggler refuses to leave and Thomas makes pointed fun of him.<ref name="AlBellCommentary" />

The bleachers were set-up so that there would be more seating that included a better view of the stage, and a fence was built around the stage for the artists' safety. In addition, a large group of African-American policemen from the [[LAPD]] were requested to be scattered inside and outside the Coliseum.<ref name="BowmanChuckDCommentary">{{cite video|people=Bowman, Rob (Historian) |date=January 10, 2006 |title=''Wattstax'': Audio commentary with Rob Bowman and Chuck D |url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070902/ |medium=DVD |publisher=Warner Home Video |location=Burbank, CA |access-date=April 18, 2020 }}</ref>

The dressing rooms for Stax's artists were outside/behind the stadium, and two vans were rented to drive the artists up to the stage and back to the dressing rooms. Portable restrooms were rented (for the artists to use before and after their sets) and placed right under the side of the stage. Colored stage lighting was hammered onto poles on each corner of the stage. Stacked speakers were placed in each corner of the fenced area. Below the stage, a long table was placed to hold several open reel tape recorders, capturing the concert performances for later release on records.<ref name="RobGordonRespectYourselfWattstax" />

A film crew, made up of a significant number of African-Americans at Stax's request,<ref name="AlBellCommentary" /> was scattered from the top-row of the stadium to the corners of the stage where the artists were zoomed-in-on. The film crew was told to capture the artists singing, but also get shots of the crowd dancing. The attendance of 112,000 was said to be the largest gathering of African-Americans outside of a civil rights event to that date.<ref name="RobGordonRespectYourselfWattstax" />