Sunday, January 25, 2026

New Documentary Chronicles What West Altadena’s Black Community Lost—and How It’s Rebuilding

“Beneath the Ashes” premieres Feb. 1 at Pasadena screening featuring fire survivors and relatives of Jackie and Mack Robinson

Before the Eaton Fire swept through West Altadena last January, approximately 75 percent of African Americans in the community owned their homes—nearly double the national rate, according to census data cited by LAist. That remarkable figure was no accident: after mid-20th-century redlining policies in Pasadena and other nearby cities restricted Black families from purchasing property, Altadena became one of the few places where they could buy homes and build generational wealth.

A new documentary premiering less than a month after the fire’s one-year anniversary captures what that community lost—and how it is working to rebuild.

“Beneath the Ashes: the Past Reimagined,” directed by Hrag Yedalian and produced by Brandon D. Lamar, president of the NAACP Pasadena Branch, will screen free to the public on Sunday, February 1, at the AGBU Vatche and Tamar Manoukian Cultural Center in Pasadena. The film features homeowners who lost everything, renters searching for stability, and community leaders who watched generations of Black homeownership go up in flames.

Among those appearing in the documentary are fire survivors Dawn Moore and Rand Vance, as well as Rose and Dennis Robinson—family members of Olympic silver medalist Mack Robinson and his brother Jackie Robinson, who broke Major League Baseball’s color barrier in 1947. Both Robinson brothers grew up in Pasadena and are memorialized with bronze statues outside Pasadena City Hall.

The film also features artist Keni Arts, Pastor Thomas Bereal of Abounding Grace Ministries, former California Assemblymember and Pasadena Mayor Chris Holden, and PUSD School Board Member Patrice Marshall McKenzie.

Lamar, who founded the nonprofit Project Passion Inc. and serves as vice chair of the Pasadena Rental Housing Board, has been active in fire relief efforts since the disaster. The Los Angeles Rams named him one of its 2025 “pLAymakers” for community service.

“What really hit me was seeing people find hope again, neighbors helping neighbors, youth volunteering, and elders smiling through tears,” Lamar said in an interview with the Rams. “That’s when I knew our work was bigger than any one organization—it was about restoring dignity and rebuilding community from the ground up.”

Yedalian, a Pasadena-based documentary filmmaker, previously worked at the USC Shoah Foundation, an organization founded by Steven Spielberg that preserves testimonies of Holocaust and genocide survivors. He has been leading the “Ashes and Echoes” oral history project, which interviews Altadena residents affected by the fire.

The screening runs from 4:30 p.m. to 8 p.m., with doors opening at 4 p.m. The AGBU Vatche and Tamar Manoukian Cultural Center is located at 2495 East Mountain Street in Pasadena. Admission is free, but registration is required through Eventbrite.

A trailer is available at BeneathTheAshes.com.