"Jasper," part of PBS's documentary film series "P.O.V.", premieres at 9pm Wednesday on WTTW-Ch. 11 as part of three days of exposure. Williams and Dow are scheduled to be interviewed and present clips of the film on ABC's "Nightline" at 10:35pm Tuesday on WLS-Ch. 7. The filmmakers also are talking about the film on "The Oprah Winfrey Show" at 9am Tuesday on Channel 7.

On Thursday, Koppel will moderate a town hall meeting at Jasper, 90 minutes of which will be carried on PBS stations (including Channel 11 at 9pm), and 60 minutes to air on "Nightline."

"I'm not sure any one thing, any one television program, or any one article in a newspaper, or any one book can galvanize the country," says "Nightline" executive producer Tom Bettag. "But I think everybody who watches will be, in some way, moved pretty deeply."

"Jasper" tells the stories of some of the town's people, and how Dow and Williams present them prompted Bettag to spotlight "Jasper" under "Nightline's" ongoing initiative of race relations coverage, "America in Black and White."

"Jasper" tracks the town during a year as it went through the trials of three men - John William King, Lawrence Russell Brewer and Shawn Berry - in the murder of James Byrd Jr.

It was Williams and Dow's goal to present a snapshot of how citizens felt and reacted as the nation's attention was centered on the modern-day equivalent of a lynching, and hopefully show there was more to Jasper than racist whites and angry blacks. "They've been defined by outside agencies since this murder," Dow says. "We thought it would be fair to have them be able to respond to some of the way they've been covered."

Williams, 46, who is African-American, and Dow, 41, who is white, used film crews of their respective races, with the black crew interviewing blacks and the white crew interviewing whites in the town.

"It just seemed to make sense to us," Williams says, "that if you're going to make a film about race relations, and if you want to look at Jasper as a kind of prism for race relations, the best way would be to give each community a space to speak comfortably, and hopefully candidly, about their viewpoint."

What is Jasper, Texas, in "Two Towns of Jasper" ?

Jasper is Trent Smith, a white electronics salesman with white power tattoos on his body who insists he has no real hatred of African-Americans.

Jasper is Stella Byrd, James' mother, who instead of condemning white people in general, only blames "three people that done it. And underneath my smile and my face, I'm very deeply hurt and affected."

Jasper is members of the Bubbas in Training Breakfast Club, whites who don't have any trouble conveying racist thoughts (one questions the problem with the "n" word), but who feel no one deserves to die as Byrd did.

Jasper is Ethel Parks, a black woman whose memories of how a friend was found murdered still affect her, but who still asked the brother of one of the killers why his sibling would associate with such heinous people.

Jasper is Louis Berry, Shawn's brother and the one interrogated by Parks, who deals with his brother's actions while still defending him.

Jasper is KJAS radio station owner Mike Lout, covering the trials evenly while having some interesting thoughts when his journalist hat is off.

Jasper could be "anyplace," Bettag says. "We always say the film could have been made anywhere, but we tried very hard to make the film representational," Dow says. "Not to identify key people that we thought were good or bad, but really make them representational of ideals that we believe in America and, in effect, we found in Jasper."