Departures of note

Marjoe Gortner was an American former child evangelist preacher and actor. Born into a family with a long evangelical heritage, he was ordained as a preacher at age four and toured the revival circuit throughout his childhood, becoming one of the youngest known ordained preachers and a sensation in the American South. As a young man he grew disillusioned with the lucrative business of Pentecostal preaching and agreed to be followed by filmmakers Howard Smith and Sarah Kernochan on a final 1971 revival tour, revealing the deceptive methods used by evangelists. The resulting documentary, Marjoe, won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature in 1972 and became a landmark criticism of televangelism.