This video series from the NC Museum of History combines documentary and narrative for a look at our role in the American Revolution
by Rachel Simon | photography by John Hansen

What does it take to bring North Carolina’s role in the American Revolution to vivid, thrilling life 250 years later? “Five thousand words, 181 script pages, 100-plus costumes, 76 characters, 48 actors, lots of wigs and a Greek chorus,” says Sally Causey Bloom, the North Carolina Museum of History’s curator of education and the driving force behind It’s Revolutionary!, a new 20-part video series from the museum that depicts the state’s revolutionary past. The ambitiously sweeping project will be available free to watch starting July 3 on the museum’s website, accompanied by a number of educational materials highlighting the war’s scope and impact.

Blending documentary filmmaking with narrative storytelling, It’s Revolutionary! is the capstone of a multiyear initiative from the museum’s “Beyond the Exhibits” outreach branch, intended to educate North Carolinians on our state’s remarkable history. “It’s a way to get everyone thinking about revolutionary times, asking questions about that history and revisiting it in a new and fresh way,” says Bloom, who wrote each installment’s engaging script.

While the project’s premise is fairly straightforward — a voice actor reads a documentary script on the revolution that’s filled with errors, each one causing a real historical figure to interrupt and portray the true events — its creation was anything but. Bloom spent over a year writing the scripts and conducting extensive research to accurately integrate North Carolina’s revolutionary role. In early 2025, the curator’s team (including director Jerry Taylor) auditioned dozens of local actors and professional reenactors to fill the series’ vast ensemble. Filming took place over five long summer weeks, with hours each day devoted to perfecting the cast’s period costumes, hair and makeup. All the historic scenes were filmed using green screen, requiring months of post-production work and “an incredible amount of image research” and animation efforts for the documentary sections, says Bloom.

It’s Revolutionary! immerses viewers in its historic truths and reimaginings, highlighting both famed dramatic events and lesser-known Revolutionary characters who deserve more recognition. One such figure is Baroness Frederika Charlotte Riedesel, a German writer and spouse of a British Army soldier who heroically spent days tending to wounded soldiers in an overcrowded shelter.

“A lot of times, we hear stories through the lens of a man at war, and this was very unique to be able to see it through the eye of a woman and a mother and a wife,” says actor Angie Staheli, who mastered a 1700s German dialect for the role and studied the baroness’ intricate diaries.

Another lesser-known tale featured in the series is that of North Carolina resident Jane Spurgeon, who defied her Tory husband to secretly help the patriots and later appealed to the state’s General Assembly to keep her land and not be called a loyalist. Her story was among those chosen by Bloom to underscore the intimate impact of an international battle. “It was community against community, neighbor against neighbor, sometimes family against family,” she explains. “Everybody was affected, whether you wanted to be or not… it came to you.”

After finishing the series, viewers affected by the stories can continue their learning by participating in the museum’s broader It’s Revolutionary! educational program. Funded through a grant by the North Carolina Society of the Cincinnati as part of an effort to increase access to American Revolution-focused materials, the “Beyond the Exhibits” initiative has been producing museum exhibits, magazines and short films about the era since 2021. This year, to go along with the series’ premiere, it’ll release a number of teacher workshops and educator notebooks with all-age lesson plans that connect directly back to the videos. 

While students and teachers are the target audience of these secondary materials, the series itself is intended for all viewers to enjoy. “I really hope it invites people to explore and ask their own questions,” says Bloom. “See what happened around you and how it still affects your life today.”

Schools have been teaching the American Revolution for centuries, she adds, but many North Carolinians might not realize just how close to home its events occurred. “I want people to understand that history is all around them,” explains Bloom. “It didn’t take place just in Boston or Philly or New York or Savannah or Charleston, the cities we know about. It took place in everybody’s backyards.”  

Stream It’s Revolutionary! on bte250.com starting July 3.

This article originally appeared in the July 2026 issue of WALTER magazine.