Actors Re-enact California Gay Marriage Trial for YouTube

The U.S. Supreme Court blocked video coverage of the trial challenging California's gay marriage ban, but two Los Angeles filmmakers have found a clever way to publicize the proceedings. They've hired actors to re-enact all the arguments and testimony of the trial.

In the days after the high court ruling, John Ireland and John Ainsworth began "The Perry vs. Schwarzenegger Trial Re-enactment." They told AOL News their motivation was to let members of the public hear the arguments firsthand and decide for themselves whether the right to marry should be extended to same-sex couples.

The cast of 40 professional actors use court transcripts as scripts and are re-enacting every moment of the proceedings. The first episode was uploaded this week at marriagetrial.com and on YouTube:



Eleven more episodes will follow.

Testimony in the case ended last week. Closing arguments are expected next month.

Proposition 8, approved by voters in 2008, banned same-sex couples from marrying in California. A gay couple from Burbank and a lesbian couple from Berkeley filed a suit arguing that the measure unconstitutionally deprived them of their right to get married. The case is expected to end up before the U.S. Supreme Court.