Little Richard (film) in London in 1962. The cast includes Leon as Little Richard Penniman, Jenifer Lewis as Richard's mother Leva Mae, or as she's listed in the movie credits, Muh Penniman, Carl Lumbly as Richard's stern father, Charles "Bud" Penniman, Tamala Jones as Richard's girlfriend Lucille (actually Audrey Robinson), Garrett Morris as Richard's preacher Carl Rainey and Mel Jackson as legendary producer Robert "Bumps" Blackwell. For his role as Penniman, Leon earned nominations for Best Actor in the Black Reel Awards and the NAACP Image Awards. Little Richard (film) Little Richard is a 2000 biographical NBC television film written by Bill Kerby
Nick Penniman Nick Penniman Nick Penniman is the co-founder and CEO of Issue One, an American nonprofit organization whose mission is to strengthen American democracy and government ethics. Previously, Penniman was executive director of the Huffington Post Investigative Fund, which he founded with Arianna Huffington in 2009. Supported by large foundations and The Huffington Post, the operation established a multi-media newsroom of journalists. It was profiled in media publications, including the "American Journalism Review" and the "Columbia Journalism Review". In 2011, it merged with the Center for Public Integrity. Penniman founded the American News Project, an early experiment into online video journalism