<p>The biopic "Ray," a Hollywood blockbuster that chronicles the life of legendary musician Ray Charles, appears to have taken some creative liberties about the artist being banned from Georgia after refusing to play a segregated concert.</p><p>The film includes a scene in which Charles refuses to play a segregated concert in Augusta at the urging of a crowd of young street protesters. The stand earns him a lifetime ban from the state of Georgia, according to the movie released Oct. 29.</p><p>The canceled show is real. But the protest never occurred and the ban never happened, according to historical documents and interviews conducted by The Augusta Chronicle.</p><p>"That's probably some Hollywood stuff," said Augusta native Silas Norman, 63, who was a junior at the city's Paine College in 1961 _ the year of the concert.</p><p>Norman, an active local civil rights advocate at the time, said he and others learned about the concert too late to publicly protest it. Instead, they sent a telegram to the hotel where Charles was staying, asking him not to play the segregated show.</p><p>"Clearly, the telegram was received," said Norman, now an internist at the Detroit Medical Center. "We didn't make a big issue out of it and, as far as we know, he didn't make any fanfare."</p><p>The movie then mentions a lawsuit filed against Charles by the Augusta concert promoter and shows a sequence of newspaper headlines _ including one from the Louisville (Ken.) Defender, that said Charles was banned from Georgia for life.</p><p>In the film, Charles is barred from the state until the Georgia Legislature apologizes and makes his song, "Georgia On My Mind," the state song in 1979.</p><p>Staff members at the University of Louisville's Ekstrom Library, where archives of the Defender are kept, found no such article.</p><p>"It seems that the Louisville Defender article does not exist," said Kelly Buckman, a reference librarian who checked both the archives and government records.</p><p>Charles made no mention of a ban in his autobiography, "Brother Ray," published in 1978, and records show he performed in the state several times during the alleged ban.</p><p>Research of state archives show no record of a ban or the apology by the Legislature the movie cites in its closing credits.</p><p>"The only thing that shows up is in 1979, when he performed 'Georgia On My Mind,' before the state Legislature," said Joanne Smalley, a reference archivist with the Georgia Archives who said she checked governors' files and changes to Georgia law.</p><p>Universal Pictures publicity representatives in Atlanta did not respond to requests by the Augusta paper to interview screenwriter James L. White and director Taylor Hackford.</p><p>Steve Clements, a professor of communications who teaches film history at Augusta State University, said substituting a street protest for a telegram is typical creative license for a Hollywood take on a true story.</p><p>But he said apparently inventing a ban raises more questions.</p><p>"When you get to events that depict a city or state its point of view, facts are important," he said. "It is the responsibility of the writer of the screenplay to check his facts."</p><p>___</p><p>HASH(0x2864b70)</p>