In Popular Culture
Actress Susan Hayward won the Best Actress Academy Award for playing Graham in the movie I Want to Live! (1958), which strongly suggests Graham was innocent. However, much of the film is fictionalized—in particular, the presentation of the manner in which the police found and arrested Graham. Evidence clearly pointed to her guilt. Reporter Gene Blake, who covered Graham's murder trial for the Los Angeles Daily Mirror, called the movie "a dramatic and eloquent piece of propaganda for the abolition of the death penalty."
Graham was also portrayed by actress Lindsay Wagner in a 1983 TV version of I Want to Live!
Jazz/pop singer Nellie McKay has an hour-long touring production entitled I Want To Live! that tells the story through standards, original tunes, and dramatic interludes.
Read more about this topic: Barbara Graham
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