Moonshiners is an American docudrama television series on the Discovery Channel that dramatizes the life of people who produce (illegal) moonshine in the Appalachian Mountains of North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia. The series dramatizes their liquor production efforts, law-evading techniques and life. There have been claims by local officials that the show is not what it portrays to be. Virginia authorities have stated that no illegal liquor is actually being produced by the people depicted in the show. The Virginia Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC) said in March 2012 that, “If illegal activity was actually taking place, the Virginia ABC Bureau of Law Enforcement would have taken action.” They also said that they had requested for the producers to add a disclaimer to clarify that the show was only a dramatization, “but the request was overlooked”, and the show’s producers, Magilla Entertainment, have stated their documentary content is real.

Portions of the show that feature Marvin “Popcorn” Sutton were taken from a documentary film by Neal Hutcheson. Hutcheson’s documentary was filmed in 2002 and released the same year with the title This is the Last Dam Run of Likker I’ll Ever Make. In 2008, a version of the documentary that was edited for television was broadcast on PBS and the Documentary Channel  with the title The Last One, and it received a Southeast Emmy Award in 2009. Sutton was arrested in 2007 by ATF agents in Cocke County, Tennessee (led by Jim Cavanaugh of Waco siege fame) for illegally distilling liquor and possession of a handgun by a felon, and was sentenced to eighteen months in jail in 2009. He subsequently committed suicide, apparently to avoid serving the federal prison term, and because he had been diagnosed with cancer.

The show’s first season premiered on December 6, 2011, and its second season premiered on November 7, 2012. Season 3 premiered on November 3, 2013. Season 4 premiered on November 4, 2014. Season 5’s premiere date is November 17, 2015.

Featured Music:

Soul Kitchen by X

Messy Bessy, Get Undressy by Pink & Brown

Smokestack Lightnin’ by Howlin’ Wolf

“There was a word for what he was that nice people didn’t say except in the dirtiest jokes. He knew. Always had. There was no need for more of him. His life was a gross testament to cowardice and repugnance.”

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Sam Tallent’s Half Hour Prophecy Ep. 22: Moonshiners

Sam Tallent is a comedian and writer from Denver, Colorado. He lives in Las Vegas, Nevada with his wife and dog. His interests include Southern Gothic fiction and the “death” of Elvis Presley. He enjoys slow simmered suppers and writing in the third person.

Audio Mixing by Wally Wallace

A Sexpot Comedy Production

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