Posted 38 minutes agoSubscribe to Screen Time NewsletterCaret DownEthan Hawke's "The Lowdown" Character Is Based On A Real-Life Activist Who Exposed Some Of America's Darkest Racial HistoryThis guy's obsessive research led to a reckoning and real changes in Tulsa, Oklahoma.by Eden Arielle GordonBuzzFeed ContributorFacebookPinterestLink In Hulu's The Lowdown, Ethan Hawke plays a citizen journalist named Lee Raybon, who goes to extreme and sometimes dangerous lengths to uncover the truth. Tap to play GIF Tap to play GIF Hulu / Via giphy.com Hawke's character is based on a real-life journalist named Lee Roy Chapman, who was responsible for unveiling some disturbing truths about Tulsa, Oklahoma's past. Tap to play GIF Tap to play GIF Hulu / Via giphy.com Here's what to know about Chapman's life and work. Tap to play GIF Tap to play GIF Hulu / Via giphy.com 1. Chapman was a citizen journalist who lived and worked in Tulsa. View this video on YouTube This Land Press / Via youtube.com He was an active community member in the early 2000s whose work included reporting, video-making, and more. Chapman also was a friend of The Lowdown director Sterlin Harjo, and the two worked together on the video series "Tulsa Public Secrets," a YouTube series from This Land Press that followed Chapman as he explored Tulsa and told stories about its local legends and secrets. Chapman had no professional journalistic training, and worked a series of jobs including screen printing and used book sales across his life. (In the series, Hawke's character sleeps above his bookstore, and the real-life Chapman also owned a used and rare bookstore). But his brilliant research abilities shone through in the quality of his work and the truth he exposed. 2. He was responsible for unveiling Tulsa founding father Tate Brady's connections to the Ku Klux Klan and the Tulsa Race Massacre. View this video on YouTube This Land Press / Via youtube.com Chapman's best-known contribution to Tulsa history was his research into Tate Brady, who helped found Tulsa in the early 1900s. Up until Chapman's research was published, Brady was a celebrated figure in Tulsa, and a number of streets, a theater, and a hotel had been named after him. 3. Chapman's research on this topic was published in a 2011 exposé called The Nightmare of Dreamland. View this video on YouTube This Land Press / Via youtube.com In the piece, Chapman revealed that Brady had deep connections to some of Tulsa and America's most sordid chapters. He reported that Brady, along with Tulsa's then-chief of police, had secretly spearheaded the Tulsa Outrage, leading their vigilante group Knights of Liberty in kidnapping and torturing seventeen union organizers on November 9, 1917. This event led the Tulsa Daily World to recognize the birth of the "Modern Ku Klux Klan" in a headline published the following day.
He also exposed Brady's connections to the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921, which was a two-day white supremacist terror attack on Tulsa's Greenwood District, which was one of America's wealthiest Black communities at the time. The attack led to between fifty and 300 deaths and thousands of hospitalizations, as well as the destruction of more than a thousand businesses and homes.
Chapman's research revealed that Brady had volunteered to be a night guard on the night of the attack, and also showed that Brady later was appointed to the Tulsa Real Estate Exchange Commission, which relocated Black residents from the area. Chapman also revealed that Brady had profited significantly from the acquisition of property damaged after the attack. 4. His work had real-world implications for Tulsa - and Brady himself. View this video on YouTube This Land Press / Via youtube.com Chapman's work sparked a reckoning in Tulsa and led to the renaming of many establishments that bore Brady's moniker. Brady Street was later renamed to Reconciliation Way, and Brady Arts District became Tulsa Arts District. 5. Chapman went on to continue his activism, and founded the Center For Public Secrets. Tap to play GIF Tap to play GIF Hulu / Via giphy.com The center is a nonprofit that focuses on untold Oklahoma stories, and artifacts Chapman recovered that later ended up in the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture. 6. Now, his legacy lives on in The Lowdown. Tap to play GIF Tap to play GIF Hulu / Via giphy.com Chapman died in 2015 at the age of 46, but he left a huge impact behind. "I'm not that surprised [that a TV character is based on him] honestly. He's a special guy and like, nothing the guy ever did surprised me. So, it's very surreal, but I guess I'm kind of not surprised in a way," his sister Whitney told 2 News Oklahoma in 2025. "With Lee, anything can happen."She also added that she approved of the show's casting choices. "When I heard it was Ethan, I was like, I bet Lee would be happy about that," she added. Stream The Lowdown on Hulu.