Documentary looks at Ann Richards 20 years after she was governor

Former Texas governor Ann Richards is the subject of the HBO documentary "All About Ann." Former Texas governor Ann Richards is the subject of the HBO documentary "All About Ann." Photo: Pam Francis, Getty Images Photo: Pam Francis, Getty Images Image 1 of / 5 Caption Close Documentary looks at Ann Richards 20 years after she was governor 1 / 5 Back to Gallery

Having learned from her father that hard work would take her where she wanted to go, Ann Richards reimagined and reinvented herself from housewife to schoolteacher to volunteer to politician while displaying a sense of pragmatism and personality sorely lacking today.

Appropriately, she will receive a long-overdue reintroduction to Texans, and to residents of the lesser 49 states, through a documentary that has undergone considerable reinvention in its own right.

"All About Ann: Governor Richards of the Lone Star State," which premieres at 8 p.m. Monday on HBO, will be familiar material to those who recall Richards' four-year term (1991-94) as governor and her subsequent role as reproductive rights crusader, women's advocate and laugh-out-loud talk-show standout until her death in 2006.

Younger viewers, and non-Texans, will meet a woman whose tart wit and Texas drawl would have made her a perfect foil for a Jon Stewart or Stephen Colbert and whose convictions endure through the work of her daughter, Cecile Richards, who is president of the Planned Parenthood Federation of America.

"She pushed me and every other woman she knew to take chances and do things even if they were tough," Cecile Richards said. "I feel she's certainly at my shoulder if I ever consider holding back or not taking a risk or opportunity. I hear her voice."

"All About Ann" began as "Ann Richards' Texas," a 2012 documentary directed by Keith Patterson and Jack Lofton that was acquired last year by HBO and redone with contributions from the original filmmakers and Sheila Nevins, president of HBO Documentary Films, and producer/editor Phillip Schopper.

Nevins had only passing knowledge of Richards from her keynote speech at the 1988 Democratic National Convention during which Richards famously said of Republican presidential nominee George H.W. Bush, "Poor George. He can't help it. He was born with a silver foot in his mouth."

"I met Ann in the film, and I grew to love her in the editing room," Nevins said. "I think she is the purest, cleanest, toughest woman I have encountered other than Gloria Steinem, and I was entranced by what I knew about her and embarrassed that I didn't know more."

More Information 'All About Ann' When: 8 p.m. Monday Network: HBO

Nevins said "All About Ann" is unique in HBO's history in that it is essentially a new product using existing footage. It includes interview segments from former President Bill Clinton, Democratic presidential candidate Michael Dukakis, former CBS News anchor Dan Rather and others that were gathered for the original film but not used.

By rearranging the film, Nevins said, "I thought we could treat the topic more seriously. We wanted to be more reverential and honest and bring the film to another level, which we did."

The original music was scrapped, and interview segments with singers Dolly Parton and Willie Nelson were replaced by new material, including an interview with transplanted Texan Liz Smith about Richards' post-gubernatorial life as a political consultant.

Houston viewers will encounter a number of familiar faces. Ron Stone, the late KPRC (Channel 2) anchor, appears in a vintage news clip in which he describes Richards' 1988 convention speech as "downright incendiary."

Interview subjects include former Lt. Gov. Ben Barnes, University of Houston political analyst Richard Murray, Houston attorney and former Texas Secretary of State Jack Rains, state Sen. Rodney Ellis and U.S. District Judge Vanessa Gilmore.

Rains, who ran for the Republican gubernatorial nomination in 1990 but lost to Clayton Williams, is the closest thing to a Richards critic/political opponent who is interviewed. Other than contemporary news clips, there are no contributions from former Gov. Mark White, who lost to Richards in the 1990 Democratic primary, or from George W. Bush, who defeated Richards in her 1994 re-election bid.

The film begins with Richards' keynote address and the crafty insistence by her staff that the arena house lights in Atlanta be lowered so all eyes - and all cameras - were on her.

It moves on through her upbringing in the Waco area, her life in Dallas before she and her husband, attorney Dave Richards, moved to Austin, her early political career as a Travis County commissioner and as state treasurer and the fact she hesitated to enter politics because she feared the stresses of campaigning and public service could end her marriage, as it did.

"Women make all kinds of decisions about their lives, and I'm proud that she decided the life she was meant to have, knowing that it might end her marriage," said Cecile Richards, who also appears in the documentary. "Politics exposed her to a lot of public scrutiny, but she was an enormously resilient person, and I hope that comes through for viewers."

The film covers Richards' bout with alcoholism, her term as governor and the campaign against George W. Bush and his campaign strategist Karl Rove, that led to her defeat and launched the younger Bush's career toward the White House.

Later segments focus on her life after politics as an advocate for women's rights and her hope that she would have 20 years after leaving office to address issues important to her (she had 12 before her death at age 73). Among those, Cecile Richards said, was the establishment of the Ann Richards School for Young Women Leaders, which has about 700 students in grades seven through 12, in Austin.

"The year I became president of Planned Parenthood was the year she got ill, and we had a year together for her to give a bunch of advice," Cecile Richards said. "One thing Mom understood is that you don't always get your way and that people who are your toughest opponents might be the people who help you down the line. Don't burn a bridge. Stand up for what you believe in, but recognize that you're in it for the long haul."

Richards said she tries to adopt her mother's attitude by balancing discouragement about what she described as "backtracking on women's rights, voting rights, civil rights" with the fact that 20 women now serve in the Senate ("We need 50") and three women are on the Supreme Court.

None of them, however, has Ann Richards' particular sparkle or her ability, her daughter said, "to make politics seem like it could be fun and interesting."

"One of her real gifts was making politics and government relevant to folks," she said. "She would say, 'If my mama back in Waco can't understand it, it's not going to work.'

"But to me, the exciting thing is that you don't have to look for another Ann Richards. There are so many women with different backgrounds and styles in public office. There was a time when a woman in politics had to be of a certain type, and we have such a difference now."