Are you a fan of Reading Rainbow? Did you watch the show as a kid or were you parents who watched it with your kids? Do you remember how special that show was? It seems like a lifetime ago that Reading Rainbow was canceled, but if you’re of Generation X then it was a part of your childhood. People like me grew up with this show. We learned to read with show this show and found more adventures and we could possibly fad them within books because of Reading Rainbow. Butterfly in the Sky is a film about one of the greatest children shows ever created that inspired a generation to read. I honestly haven’t thought much about the show in years. And after nearly 20 years since the show went off the air, it’s great to revisit this masterpiece of television. It is a really really good film that will make you laugh and cry, but more importantly, be inspired to read and love books all over again. Even if you never lost that, the nostalgia for this show will remind you why reading is important and why books are part of the fabric of our society.
There was an awful lot that I didn’t know when it came to the creation of Reading Rainbow. How did the show start? How did it last so long and what was the nail on the coffin for the show. Also having grown up with LeVar Burton from Roots to Star Trek Next Generation, and finally the host of Reading Rainbow, we’ve never heard in his own words what made the show so special. Having him interviewed and talk about how he became the host through all the adventures he had with the show to why it became one of his greatest roles on television. If you think about it, most actors are known for one or two roles, but an actor being known for three iconic roles is almost unheard of. To be known for playing a slave and showing the brutality of slavery to one of the greatest engineers in Star Trek and then that fatherly figure that we all came to know who inspired us to read, that’s a great career!
The film very much feels like a series of Reading Rainbow episodes with a lot of great footage from past episodes. The directors did an incredible job through archival footage and the interviews with the production staff and the producers and with LeVar Burton himself. It’s a phenomenal movie. I had the chance to watch this film at the Oak Cliff Film Festival back in 2022 and was greatly surprised that it took too long to get any kind of distribution so when it finally ended up on Netflix. It was great to revisit this inspirational film and to highly recommend it. Reading Rainbow was such a staple of our society, just like Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood or Sesame Street, that it’s hard to imagine that we don’t have this show anymore. Yes, nothing lasts forever, but once upon a time we had a really wonderful children show on PBS that inspired children to read. This is one of my favorite documentaries over the last decade and now that it’s on Netflix, I recommend that you watch it, but also have some tissues because it’s a great stroll down memory lane. And if you’re somebody who grew up with the show who now has kids, it’s a great reminder why we still need a show like this and how it can be fun to revisit old episodes. Telling the history of Reading Rainbow is very well done in this documentary and you won’t be disappointed when you watch it. Also, I had a great interview with the director Bradford Thomason. If you don’t know anything about the show or just want to remember how great the show was, check out Butterfly in the Sky on Netflix.
