The Shawshank Redemption is a 1994 American prison drama film written and directed by Frank Darabont, based on the 1982 Stephen King novella Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption. The film tells the story of banker Andy Dufresne, who is sentenced to life in Shawshank State Penitentiary for the murders of his wife and her lover, despite his claims of innocence. Over the following two decades, he befriends a fellow prisoner, contraband smuggler Ellis "Red" Redding, and becomes instrumental in a money laundering operation led by the prison warden Samuel Norton. William Sadler, Clancy Brown, Gil Bellows, and James Whitmore appear in supporting roles.
Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption is a realist novella by Stephen King. It was first published in 1982 by Viking Press in his collection Different Seasons. It was later included in the 2009 collection Stephen King Goes to the Movies. The plot follows former bank vice president Andy Dufresne, who is wrongly convicted of murdering his wife and her lover and ends up in Shawshank State Penitentiary, where corruption and violence are rampant.
Joliet Correctional Center was a prison in Joliet, Illinois, United States, from 1858 to 2002. It is featured in the motion picture The Blues Brothers as the prison from which Jake Blues is released at the beginning of the movie. It is also used for the exterior shots of the Illinois "state prison" in the James Cagney film White Heat, and the location for first season of Fox Network's Prison Break television show, and the movie Let's Go to Prison. In 2018, it opened for tours.
The Eastern State Penitentiary (ESP) is a former American prison in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It is located in the Fairmount section of the city, and was operational from 1829 until 1971. The penitentiary refined the revolutionary system of separate incarceration, first pioneered at the Walnut Street Jail, which emphasized principles of reform rather than punishment.
The Preston School of Industry, also known as Preston Castle, was a reform school located in Ione, California, in Amador County. It was proposed by, and ultimately named after, state senator Edward Myers Preston. The cornerstone was laid in December 1890, and the institution was opened in June 1894 when seven wards were transferred there from San Quentin State Prison. It is considered one of the oldest and best-known reform schools in the United States.
Ghost Hunters is an American paranormal and reality television series. The original series aired from October 6, 2004 until October 26, 2016 on Syfy. The original program spanned eleven seasons with 230 episodes, not including 10 specials. The series was revived in early 2019 and aired its twelfth and thirteenth seasons from August 21, 2019, to May 27, 2020, on A&E, after which it was cancelled and then revived for its fourteenth season only months later on Discovery+, which started airing on October 31, 2021. Season 15 began October 1, 2022 on Travel Channel. Season 16 of Ghost Hunters is set to release on Travel Channel on April 6, 2023.
The Waverly Hills Sanatorium is a former sanatorium located in the Waverly Hills neighborhood of Louisville, Kentucky.
Paranormal television is a genre of reality television that purports to document factual investigations of the paranormal rather than fictional representations seen in traditional narrative films and TV. Over the years, the genre has grown to be a staple of television and even changed the programming focus of networks like the History Channel and the Travel Channel. By highlighting beliefs in topics ranging from Bigfoot to aliens, paranormal television continues to elevate popular interest in the paranormal.
Shawshank State Prison is a fictional New England state prison in the state of Maine. It serves as the primary location in the novella Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption by Stephen King, as well as its subsequent film adaptation. The prison has also been mentioned in several other works by King.
Proof Positive is a paranormal investigation reality television show broadcast by the SciFi Channel beginning on October 6, 2004, through December 8, 2004. It was shown as part of the "SciFi Wednesday" evening schedule line up in the United States along with other reality television programs as Scare Tactics and Ghost Hunters. Proof Positive ran for ten episodes.
Malabar Farm State Park is a state park in Richland County, Ohio, United States, located near Lucas and the Mohican State Park.
Tennessee State Prison is a former correctional facility located six miles west of downtown Nashville, Tennessee on Cockrill Bend. It opened in 1898 and has been closed since 1992 because of overcrowding concerns. The mothballed facility was severely damaged by an EF3 tornado in the tornado outbreak of March 2–3, 2020.
Ghost hunting is the process of investigating locations that are purportedly haunted by ghosts. Typically, a ghost-hunting team will attempt to collect evidence supporting the existence of paranormal activity.
The West Virginia Penitentiary is a gothic-style prison located in Moundsville, West Virginia. Now withdrawn and retired from prison use, it operated from 1866 to 1995. Currently, the site is maintained as a tourist attraction, museum, training facility, and filming location.
The Ohio Reformatory for Women (ORW) is a state prison for women owned and operated by the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction in Marysville, Ohio. It opened in September 1916, when 34 female inmates were transferred from the Ohio Penitentiary in Columbus. ORW is a multi-security, state facility. As of July 2019, 2,394 female inmates were living at the prison ranging from minimum-security inmates all the way up to one inmate on death row. It was the fifth prison in the United States, in modern times, to open a nursery for imprisoned mothers and their babies located within the institution. The Achieving Baby Care Success (ABC) program was the first in the state to keep infants with their mothers.
The Ohio Penitentiary, also known as the Ohio State Penitentiary, was a prison operated from 1834 to 1984 in downtown Columbus, Ohio, in what is now known as the Arena District. The state had built a small prison in Columbus in 1813, but as the state's population grew the earlier facility was not able to handle the number of prisoners sent to it by the courts. When the penitentiary first opened in 1834, not all of the buildings were completed. The prison housed 5,235 prisoners at its peak in 1955. Prison conditions were described as "primitive" and the facility was eventually replaced by the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility, a maximum security facility in Lucasville. During its operation, it housed several well-known inmates, including General John H. Morgan, George "Bugs" Moran, O. Henry, Chester Himes, and Sam Sheppard. A separate women's prison was built within its walls in 1837. The buildings were demolished in 1997.
Randal Allen Mihailoff is an American actor and former professional wrestler.
Alcatraz Island has appeared many times in popular culture. Its appeal in film derives from its picturesque setting, natural beauty, isolation, and its history as a U.S. penitentiary – from which, officially, no prisoner ever successfully escaped.
Ghost Adventures is an American paranormal and reality television series that premiered on October 17, 2008, on the Travel Channel before moving to Discovery+ in 2021. An independent film of the same name originally aired on the Sci-Fi Channel on July 25, 2007. The program follows ghost hunters Zak Bagans, Aaron Goodwin, Billy Tolley, and Jay Wasley as they investigate locations that are reported to be haunted.
David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick is an American screenwriter and producer of film and television. He wrote the horror films Orphan (2009), The Conjuring 2 (2016) and its sequel The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It (2021), and the DC Extended Universe films Aquaman (2018) and its sequel Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom (2023).
