A movie, a principal and a turnaround school: 30 years since ‘The George McKenna Story’

George McKenna doesn’t talk about it much, but Denzel Washington played him in a TV movie called “The George McKenna Story.”

Fellow LA Unified school board members may occasionally rib him about it, and on a recent tour of an elementary school, Superintendent Michelle King pointed it out to impress the students. “This man had a movie made about him, and Denzel Washington played him,” King said as the students exclaimed, “Ooooh!”