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Biographical Notes
World on Fire
Peter Bowker
Writer, World on Fire
MASTERPIECE fans remember Peter Bowker’s
impassioned adaptation of Wuthering Heights from 2009,
which captured Emily Brontë’s masterpiece in all its
complexity. With World on Fire he has created a plot with
even more twists, turns, and memorable characters, centered
on the chaotic events at the outset of World War II. Bowker
has been an established screenwriter in the U.K since
penning scripts for Casualty in the early 1990s. Since
then, he has written for many long-running series such as
Where the Heart Is and Clocking Off. His original work has
included Undercover Heart; Flesh and Blood, for which he
won Best Writer at the RTS Awards; Blackpool, which was
awarded BANFF Film Festival Best Mini-Series and Global Television Grand Prize; and
Occupation, which was awarded Best Drama Serial at the BAFTA Awards, in addition to
Best Short-Form Drama at the WGGB Awards and another RTS Best Writer Award. He
has since written Eric and Ernie and Marvellous. Both productions have won prestigious
awards, including a Best Drama BAFTA for Marvellous, which became the most popular
BBC2 single drama of the last 20 years. Most recently he has written an adaptation of John
Lanchester’s novel Capital and two series of the acclaimed The A Word.
Julia Brown
Lois Bennett, World on Fire
Driven to escape her cheating lover and dysfunctional
family, Julia Brown’s character in World on Fire finds a
wartime role that exploits her remarkable singing talent.
Luckily, Brown herself is a gifted vocalist and sang much
of the soundtrack that accompanies the episodes. In earlier
work, she has performed a host of supporting roles on
prominent TV series. 2018 saw her as a recurring
character in the fourth season of the critically acclaimed
mystery crime drama Shetland, playing a misunderstood
teenager. In the same year, she was seen as Ecgywn, future
Queen consort of Wessex, in BBC America’s popular
The Last Kingdom, based on Bernard Cornwell’s stirring
Saxon Stories. Brown was previously best known for her
2014 portrayal of Keri Summers in CBBC’s M.I. High, a whimsical action series following
the exploits of four children fighting criminals on behalf of the fictional spy agency MI9.
She reteamed with CBBC in 2015 for the TV series Eve, about the world’s first fully
sentient artificial person coming to live with an ordinary family. In 2020, Brown will also
be in The Angel of Darkness, the anticipated sequel to 2018’s The Alienist.
– more –
MASTERPIECE Winter 2020 TCA Biographies, Page 2
Jonah Hauer-King
Harry Chase, World on Fire
Jonah Hauer-King plays an idealistic British translator turned army officer in
World on Fire. He is currently in production for the live action film of The Little
Mermaid, directed by Rob Marshall, in which he will take on the role of Prince
Eric. Jonah last appeared on MASTERPIECE as Laurie in Little Women. Most
recently, in 2019 he starred alongside Clive Owen and Tim Roth in Francois
Girard’s film The Song Of Names, and played the young lead in Sony’s A Dog’s
Way Home, alongside Ashley Judd. In 2018, he starred opposite Naomi Watts
and Bobby Cannavale in James Demonaco’s Once Upon A Time In Staten Island.
Other credits include Ashes In The Snow, Old Boys and his first feature lead role,
The Last Photograph. He was also in the West End’s run of The Entertainer
starring opposite Kenneth Branagh. Jonah studied at Cambridge University.
Helen Hunt
Nancy Campbell, World on Fire
Helen Hunt’s character in World on Fire is a reporter addicted to danger, trying to
discover the truth about Nazi Germany from inside the Third Reich itself. Winner
of a Best Actress Oscar® for the romantic comedy As Good as It Gets, Hunt has
had a remarkable career, not only for her acclaimed performances on film, TV, and
the stage, but also as an accomplished writer, director and producer. She combined
all these talents in Mad About You, the 1990s TV sitcom for which she acted,
wrote, directed, and produced, earning four Emmy® Awards for Outstanding Lead
Actress, four Golden Globe® Awards (three as lead actress and one as producer
for Best Comedy), and a Screen Actors Guild Award®. The hit series is now in a
limited revival on Spectrum Originals. In other work, her 2012 performance in the
movie The Sessions garnered her an Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting
Female and nominations in the same category by the Academy Awards, Golden
Globe® Awards, SAG Awards, Broadcast Film Critics’ Awards and BAFTA Awards. Hunt’s recent big screen
roles include I See You, Candy Jar, The Miracle Season and Ride (which she also co-wrote, produced, and
directed), as well as The Night Clerk, due for release in 2020. On the small screen, she could last be seen in the
2017 Fox drama series Shots Fired, in which she played the governor of North Carolina, coping with a pair of
racially charged shootings.
Zofia Wichłacz
Kasia Tomaszeski, World on Fire
Playing a Warsaw waitress turned freedom fighter, Zofia Wichłacz is an
award-winning actress with many stellar credits on Polish film, television, and
stage, now breaking into the international scene. Most recently, in 2019 she starred
in the critically acclaimed Danish television program, DNA, playing Julita, the
young mother at the center of the story. In 2018, she starred in the Netflix original
series 1983, an alternate take on history in which the fall of communism never
took place. Also in 2018, she appeared in Matthew Weiner’s Amazon series
The Romanoffs and the critically acclaimed Polish program, Rojst for Showmax.
The previous year, she won the Shooting Star Award at the Berlin Film Festival
as one of the rising new international stars for her performances in Warsaw ’44,
Amok, and other impressive productions. Also for Warsaw ’44, she was the
youngest actress (at age 19) to win the Eagle/Discovery of the Year—
Poland’s Academy Award.
– more –
MASTERPIECE Winter 2020 TCA Biographies, Page 3
Susanne Simpson
Executive Producer, MASTERPIECE
Since joining MASTERPIECE in 2007, Simpson has been responsible for such
programs as Sherlock, Wolf Hall, and Victoria, and oversaw all aspects of the
U.S. broadcast of the hit series Downton Abbey, the most watched drama in PBS
history and recipient of 59 Emmy® nominations and 12 wins. She is also the
Executive Producer of MASTERPIECE Studio, a podcast with more than 14
million downloads since 2016. Simpson created the MASTERPIECE Trust, a fund
to ensure the future of the series. She is a two-time Academy Award® nominee
and two-time Emmy® winner for her documentary and dramatic films for
television and theater. Prior to MASTERPIECE, she was a Senior Producer for the
science series NOVA, responsible for the content development, financing, and
production of new programming, and was the executive producer of IMAX
productions such as the award-winning Shackleton's Antarctic Adventure. Simpson is a member of the Academy
of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, and the Writers Guild.
About MASTERPIECE
Winner of 83 Primetime Emmys® and 16 Peabody Awards, MASTERPIECE has been essential Sunday night
viewing for millions of fans since 1971. Rebecca Eaton is the executive-producer-at-large for the series, and
Susanne Simpson is the executive producer. Funding for MASTERPIECE is provided by Viking and Raymond
James with additional support from public television viewers and contributors to The MASTERPIECE Trust.
Presented on PBS by WGBH Boston, MASTERPIECE is known for recent hits such as Sherlock, Downton
Abbey and Victoria, and beloved classics such as Upstairs Downstairs, Prime Suspect, The Forsyte Saga and
Poldark.
pbs.org/masterpiece
MASTERPIECE Press Contacts
Ellen Dockser, 617-300-5338, ellen_dockser@wgbh.org
Laura Garvey, 617-300-5342, laura_garvey@wgbh.org
FUNDING FOR MASTERPIECE PROVIDED BY
AMERICAN EXPERIENCE “George W. Bush”
Premieres Monday and Tuesday, May 4-5, 2020
TCA Panelists
Participants
Andrew H. Card, Jr. served as Chief of Staff in the presidential administration of George
W. Bush from November 26, 2000 to April 14, 2006, making him the second longest-
serving White House chief of staff.
From 1992 until 1993, Mr. Card served as the 11th U.S. Secretary of Transportation under
President George H. W. Bush. In August 1992, at the request of President Bush, Secretary
Card coordinated the administration’s disaster relief efforts in the wake of Hurricane
Andrew. From 1988 to 1992, Mr. Card served in President Bush’s administration as
Assistant to the President and Deputy Chief of Staff. He served in President Reagan's
administration as Special Assistant to the President for Intergovernmental Affairs and subsequently as Deputy
Assistant to the President and Director of Intergovernmental Affairs, where he was liaison to governors, statewide
elected officials, state legislators, mayors and other elected officials.
Prior to being named Chief of Staff for the presidential administration of George W. Bush, Mr. Card was General
Motors’ Vice President of Government Relations. From 1993 to 1998, Mr. Card was President and Chief Executive
Officer of the American Automobile Manufacturers Association (AAMA), the trade association whose members were
Chrysler Corporation, Ford Motor Company and General Motors Corporation.
Mr. Card served in the Massachusetts House of Representatives from 1975-1983. In 1982, he was named Legislator of
the Year by the National Republican Legislators Association and received the Distinguished Legislator Award from
the Massachusetts Municipal Association.
Mr. Card graduated from the University of South Carolina with a Bachelor of Science degree in engineering. He
attended the United States Merchant Marine Academy and the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard
University and has received numerous honorary degrees and awards. A native of Holbrook, Massachusetts, Andy and
his wife, Kathleene, have three children and four grandchildren.
Ari Fleischer, former White House press secretary, was the primary spokesperson for
President George W. Bush and delivered the daily White House briefings from 2001 to
2003. He previously served as the spokesperson for the Bush-Cheney presidential campaign.
In his almost four years working for President Bush, he served as spokesperson during the
historic presidential recount, September 11th, two wars and the anthrax attack. His best-
selling book, Taking Heat, details his years in the White House and reached #7 on The New
York Times Best Sellers list.
Prior to joining the Bush campaign, Fleischer was the national spokesperson and
communications director for Elizabeth Dole's presidential campaign. He has also worked on Capitol Hill as a press
secretary to three Congressmen and one U.S. Senator.
Fleischer is a native of Pound Ridge, New York, and a 1982 graduate of Vermont’s Middlebury College. Now
president of his own firm, Ari Fleischer Communications Inc., he offers advice to clients in the corporate and sports
worlds on how to handle the press. He is also a Fox News contributor.
He resides in Westchester County, New York, with his wife, Becki, and their two children.
Filmmakers
Susan Bellows (Senior Producer of AMERICAN EXPERIENCE) is an award-winning
producer and writer with more than 20 years of experience producing national programs for
public television. Bellows was the producer and director of the Emmy Award-winning JFK,
which premiered on AMERICAN EXPERIENCE in 2013, and writer, director and producer
for The Bombing of Wall Street, which premiered on the series in 2018. Since joining the
series in 2003, she has provided editorial support and guidance to its broadcast and new
media work. Previously, Bellows served as senior producer for the Peabody and Emmy
Award-winning series Africans in America. Her other producing credits include films
for The Great Depression, for which she received an Emmy nomination, and America’s War
on Poverty, both productions of Blackside, Inc. Bellows also co-produced New Worlds, New
Forms for the WNET-produced series Dancing, an eight-hour landmark series on dance forms around the world.
Barak Goodman (Writer; Senior Producer for Ark Media) has become one of the most
prolific and respected nonfiction filmmakers in America. A co-founder of Ark Media, his
films have been nominated for an Academy Award and won multiple Emmy and Writers
Guild Awards, duPont-Columbia and Peabody Awards, the RFK Journalism Prize, and three
times been official selections at the Sundance Film Festival. Among his many films for
AMERICAN EXPERIENCE are Oklahoma City, about the worst domestic terrorist attack in
American history and its roots in the rise of the radical right; My Lai, the Emmy and
Peabody Award-winning film on America’s worst war crime; Scottsboro, the Academy
Award-nominated film on the trial of black teenagers falsely accused of rape in Depression-
era Alabama; Clinton, a four-hour biography of the 42nd president; and Woodstock: Three Days that Defined a
Generation. Goodman was also the director, writer and producer of the six-hour PBS series Cancer: The Emperor of
all Maladies, based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning book by Siddhartha Mukherjee. He wrote and directed Makers, the
first complete history of the modern women's movement, and directed six films for the PBS series FRONTLINE,
including the Peabody Award-winning Lost Children of Rockdale County and the duPont-Columbia-winning
series Failure to Protect. Slay the Dragon, a film about gerrymandering and voter suppression, premiered at the 2019
Tribeca Film Festival.
Ken Burns has been making documentary films for almost 40 years. Since the Academy Award-nominated Brooklyn Bridge in 1981, Ken has gone on to direct and produce some of the most acclaimed historical documentaries ever made, including The Civil War; Baseball; Jazz; The Statue of Liberty; Huey Long; Lewis and Clark: The Journey of the Corps of Discovery; Frank Lloyd Wright; Mark Twain; Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson; The War; The National Parks: America’s Best Idea; The Roosevelts: An Intimate History; Jackie Robinson; The Vietnam War and, most recently, Country Music. A December 2002 poll conducted by Real Screen Magazine listed The Civil War as second only to Robert Flaherty’s Nanook of the North as the “most influential documentary of all time,” and named Ken Burns and Robert Flaherty as the “most influential documentary makers” of all time. In March 2009, David Zurawik of The Baltimore Sun said, “... Burns is not only the greatest documentarian of the day, but also the most influential filmmaker period. That includes feature filmmakers like George Lucas and Steven Spielberg. I say that because Burns not only turned millions of persons onto history with his films, he showed us a new way of looking at our collective past and ourselves.” The late historian Stephen Ambrose said of his films, “More Americans get their history from Ken Burns than any other source.” Future film projects include films on Ernest Hemingway and Muhammad Ali, among others. Ken’s films have been honored with dozens of major awards, including 16 Emmy Awards, two Grammy Awards and two Oscar nominations. In September 2008, at the News & Documentary Emmy Awards, Ken was honored by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences with a Lifetime Achievement Award. Sarah Burns is the author of The Central Park Five: A Chronicle of a City Wilding (Knopf, 2011) and, along with David McMahon and Ken Burns, the producer, writer and director of the documentary The Central Park Five, about the five Black and Latino teenagers who were wrongly convicted in the infamous Central Park Jogger rape of 1989. The film premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 2012, was named the Best Non- Fiction film of 2012 by the New York Film Critics Circle and won a 2013 Peabody Award. She produced and directed, along with David McMahon and Ken Burns, the two- part, four-hour Jackie Robinson, a biography of the celebrated baseball player and civil rights icon, which she wrote with McMahon. The film aired on PBS in April 2016 and she and McMahon were nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Writing for a Nonfiction Program and won a WGA award for Documentary Script.
She recently finished a documentary about public housing in Atlanta called East Lake Meadows: A Public Housing Story and is working on a documentary series on the life of Muhammad Ali. David McMahon has been making award-winning documentary films for more than a decade. In 2010, along with Ken Burns and Lynn Novick, he wrote and produced The Tenth Inning, a two-part, four-hour update to their Emmy Award-winning series, Baseball. With Ken Burns and Sarah Burns, he wrote, produced and directed The Central Park Five, a two-hour film about the five teenagers who were wrongly convicted in the Central Park Jogger case of 1989, which won a Peabody Award and Best Non-Fiction Film of 2012 from The New York Film Critics Circle. In 2016 he teamed with Ken Burns and Sarah Burns again to produce and direct Jackie Robinson, a two-part, four-hour biography of the baseball and civil rights icon, for which he and Sarah Burns received an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Writing for a Nonfiction Program and won a WGA Award for Documentary Script. He recently completed East Lake Meadows: A Public Housing Story, a two-hour film about a housing project in Atlanta, and is currently at work on a series on the life of Muhammad Ali.
PBS AMERICAN PORTRAIT
Winter 2020 TCA Press Tour
Panel Bios
Bill Margol has spent over 30 years working in the media
industry, covering the ground of writer, producer, editor,
developer and executive. A graduate of Syracuse
University's S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications
and Loyola University’s Masters in Emerging Media program,
Bill was Executive Producer of Special Projects at Sci-Fi
Channel, overseeing specials, documentaries, stunts and
events from 1993-1998. He joined TNT in Atlanta as Director
of Production in 1998, and in 2003 joined Travel Channel as
VP of Production, where he was responsible for the launch of
such groundbreaking series as “Anthony Bourdain: No
Reservations.” In 2008, Bill joined National Geographic
Television as VP Development, where he created the Emmy-
nominated series "Brain Games.”
In 2014, Bill joined PBS as Sr. Director of Programming & Development and has
overseen such programs as the Emmy-winning documentary A YEAR In SPACE, the
groundbreaking series WE’LL MEET AGAIN WITH ANN CURRY, as well as
programming such as 8 DAYS: TO THE MOON AND BACK, BIG BLUE LIVE, IN THEIR
OWN WORDS, LIFE FROM ABOVE, BEYOND A YEAR IN SPACE, GENIUS: WITH
STEPHEN HAWKING and WILD ALASKA LIVE.
Jon Kamen, as Chairman and CEO of RadicalMedia, has
created one of the world’s leading generators of premium
content across all media platforms. Originally renowned for
its commercial and advertising success, RadicalMedia has
grown to dominate every corner of superior content creation
including television, feature films, music programming, live
events, graphic and interactive design. Jon continues to
embrace the future and push innovation by collaborating with
Radical’s community of artists, directors, producers, coders,
thinkers, makers and doers.
With over 150 credits, Jon’s artistic vision has been the force
behind many Oscar, Emmy, Grammy and Peabody Award-
winning and nominated titles, including The Fog of War; What Happened, Miss
Simone?; Paradise Lost; Concert for George; the pilot episode of AMC’s “Mad Men;”
“My Next Guest Needs No Introduction with David Letterman;” and “The Fourth Estate.”
RadicalMedia partnered with Bloomberg Philanthropies and National Geographic for
two environmental documentary films: Paris to Pittsburgh and From the Ashes. Recent
credits include Activate: A Global Citizen Movement for NatGeo, Conversations with a
Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes for Netflix and the upcoming “Grant” series for the History
Channel. Harpo recently announced Kamen as part of the creative team, serving as
executive producer for the upcoming Apple TV+ mental health series with Oprah
Winfrey and Prince Harry.
Kamen, a recipient of the Industry Tribute at the 2018 IFP Gotham Awards, Mayor
Bloomberg’s “Made in NY” Award and Smithsonian’s National Design Award, sits on the
board of trustees for Rhode Island School of Design, Smithsonian Cooper Hewitt
National Design Museum, The Museum of the Moving Image and Mr. Holland’s Opus
Foundation.
Dave Sirulnick, an award-winning executive producer and
President of Entertainment at RadicalMedia, lends his extensive
industry expertise toward creating and producing premium
content, series, documentaries, digital, video, news
programming, specials and live events.
Sirulnick has served as executive producer on several Radical
projects, including “Grant,” slated to debut on History Channel in
2020; “More Than an Athlete,” featuring Lebron James, for
ESPN+; “My Next Guest Needs No Introduction with David
Letterman” on Netflix; Emmy-nominated documentary “The
Fourth Estate” and The Family Business: Trump and Taxes on
Showtime; Oh, Hello on Broadway for Netflix, “The Untold Stories of the 90s” on History
Channel; Hamilton’s America on PBS; “This is A.I.” for Discovery; and IDA Documentary
Award-winning series “Bobby Kennedy for President” on Netflix. Most recently, Harpo
announced Sirulnick as part of the creative team, serving as executive producer for the
upcoming Apple TV+ mental health series with Oprah Winfrey and Prince Harry.
Prior to joining RadicalMedia, Sirulnick served as Executive Vice President of News &
Docs at MTV. During his 28-year tenure at MTV, he developed and led some of the
channel’s leading and longest-running television series, including Emmy Award-winning
documentary series “Made” (2000-2012), Emmy Award-winning series “True Life”
(1998-2014), “Total Request Live” (1998-2008), “The Week in Rock” (1987-1997), and
Peabody and Emmy Award-winning documentary series “Choose or Lose” (1992-2012),
geared toward increasing the political awareness of its viewers and promoting their
participation in local and national elections.
During this time, Sirulnick served as executive producer for MTV’s annual Video Music
Awards, producing the pre-show and the awards show for 16 years. Sirulnick also
helmed the creation of award-winning music documentaries for the network that
featured the likes of superstars Miley Cyrus, Kanye West, Lady Gaga, Drake, Ed
Sheeran, Nicki Minaj and Demi Lovato.
pbs.org • pbs.org/pressroom • facebook.com/pbs • youtube.com/pbs • twitter.com/pbspressroom
Laura Bradley has been teaching middle school students
since 1988, and currently teaches English, broadcast media
and design lab at Kenilworth Junior High School in Petaluma,
California. She is a PBS Digital Innovator All-Star, Google
Certified Innovator, National Board Certified Teacher, Bay
Area Writing Project Teacher Consultant and first-place
winner of the Henry Ford Teacher Innovator Award.
Danielle Bainbridge is an academic, writer and web series
host based in Chicago. She has a PhD in African American
Studies and American Studies from Yale University (2018),
and a BA in English and Theatre Studies from the University
of Pennsylvania (2012). In the 2018-2019 academic year, she
was a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of African
American Studies at Northwestern University. She is currently
an Assistant Professor of Theatre, Performance Studies and
African American Studies at Northwestern, where she
teaches courses on history, culture and performance. She is
the primary researcher, writer and host of the PBS Digital
Studios web series THE ORIGIN OF EVERYTHING, which
focuses on highlighting the unusual and under-told history
that makes up our collective story and streams on YouTube and Facebook Watch. Her
ongoing book project, Refinements of Cruelty: Enslavement, Enfreakment, and the
Performance Archive, examines the lives of 19th century disabled African American
sideshow and freak show performers who were enslaved.
pbs.org • pbs.org/pressroom • facebook.com/pbs • youtube.com/pbs • twitter.com/pbspressroomPress Contact:
Elizabeth Boone, WNET, 212.560.8831, BooneB@wnet.org
Gabrielle Torello, Grand Communications, 917-312-2832, gab@grandcommunications.com
Press Materials: http://pbs.org/pressroom or http://thirteen.org/pressroom
Websites: http://www.pbs.org/gperf, @GPerfPBS, facebook.com/GreatPerformances,
youtube.com/greatperformancespbs #GreatPerformancesPBS
Great Performances
TCA Bios
Great Performances: Ann premieres nationwide Friday, June 19 at 9 p.m. on
PBS (check local listings), pbs.org/gperf and the PBS Video app
Great Performances – Gloria: A Life premieres nationwide Friday, June 26 at
9 p.m. on PBS (check local listings), pbs.org/gperf and the PBS Video app
Holland Taylor
Playwright and Actor, Ann in Great Performances: Ann
Facebook: @HollandTaylorOfficial; Twitter: @HollandTaylor
Holland Taylor’s New York stage performances include Bess in “Breakfast with Les and Bess,”
the original productions of “Butley,” opposite Alan Bates, A.R. Gurney’s “The Cocktail Hour” and
recently David Lindsay Abaire’s dark comedy “Ripcord” at The Manhattan Theatre Club, and
Broadway’s “The Front Page” with Nathan Lane.
Over the years in Los Angeles, she has performed on stage in “Kindertransport” and
played opposite Christopher Lloyd in Yasmina Reza’s “The Unexpected Man” at the Geffen
Playhouse. Narrating for the Los Angeles Philharmonic in Stravinsky’s “Persephone for Essa-
Pekka Salonen” and for John Adams in Phillip Glass’ “Ahknaten,” Taylor also delivered thespoken word in the Harry Potter Suite for Maestro John Williams with the Chicago Symphony
Orchestra.
She has worked extensively in film, appearing in “Romancing the Stone,” “Jewel of the
Nile,” “To Die For,” “Next Stop Wonderland,” “One Fine Day,” “George of the Jungle,” “The
Truman Show,” “Happy Accidents,” “Spy Kids” (2 & 3), “Keeping the Faith,” “Legally Blonde,”
Tina Fey and Amy Poehler’s “Baby Mama” and “Gloria Bell,” starring Julianne Moore.
On television, Taylor has been nominated for the Emmy seven times, winning Best
Supporting Actress in a Drama for her role as Judge Roberta Kittleson on “The Practice.” Among
numerous series starring roles: “The Powers that Be,” Norman Lear’s highly acclaimed political
satire; “Bosom Buddies” with Tom Hanks; and Charlie Sheen’s “Two and a Half Men.” Her final
season of “Mr. Mercedes,” a limited TV series for Audience Network, is airing now and stars
Brenden Gleeson.
Taylor has recently filmed three movies: “The Stand-In” with Drew Barrymore;
“Bombshell,” starring Charlize Theron, Nicole Kidman, Margot Robbie and John Lithgow; and
“Bill and Ted Face the Music.”
Taylor is currently filming Ryan Murphy’s “Hollywood.” Her performance in Broadway’s
“Ann” at Lincoln Center’s Beaumont Theatre earned rave reviews, earning Taylor a Tony Award
nomination for Best Actress, Drama Desk and Drama League nominations, and the Outer Circle
Critics Award for Best Solo Performance.
Christine Lahti
Actor, Gloria Steinem in Great Performances – Gloria: A Life
Facebook: @ChristineLahtiOfficial; Twitter: @ChristineALahti; Instagram:
@officialchristinelahti
Christine Lahti earned her first Oscar nomination in 1985’s “Swing Shift” and then took the
statue home 10 years later as a first-time director for her short film “Lieberman in Love.” In
1998, after multiple nominations, Lahti won both the Emmy and her second Golden Globe
Award (TV movie “No Place Like Home” was the first) for her portrayal of Dr. Kathryn Austin on
“Chicago Hope.” Three years later, her feature film directorial debut “My First Mister” opened
the 2001 Sundance Film Festival.
Recent film credits include the independent film “Becks,” a lead role in Andrew Currie’s
independent feature “The Steps” and, opposite Kristin Wiig and Hailee Steinfeld, in “Hateship
Loveship,” which had its premiere at the 2013 Toronto International Film Festival. Additional
film credits include Sidney Lumet’s “Running on Empty,” for which she received the 1998 L.A.
Film Critics Award as well as a Golden Globe nomination; “Leaving Normal” directed by Ed
Zwick; “The Doctor” with William Hurt; Bill Forsyth’s “Housekeeping,” which was voted one of
the 20 best films of 1987 by many of America’s film critics; “Whose Life is it Anyway?” and
“…and Justice for All.”On the TV front, Lahti was most recently seen as Andrea Stevens in “The Good Fight.”
She is also well known for her recurring role of Laurel Hitchin in NBC’s “The Blacklist.” Other
television credits include Doris McGarrett in CBS’s “Hawaii Five-O” and Sonya Paxton in a
recurring role on “Law & Order: SVU.” Her most notable work on the small screen was a starring
role on the critically acclaimed series “Jack & Bobby,” for which she received both SAG and
Golden Globe nominations. She has also starred in numerous television movies including
“Amerika” (Emmy and Golden Globe nomination), Showtime’s “Out of the Ashes,” “The Pilot’s
Wife,” “Open House” and “The Book of Ruth” among others.
An esteemed thespian, Lahti last appeared on the New York stage with her performance
in The Culture Project’s “The Exonerated” alongside Marg Helgenberger and Martin Short. Prior
to that, she starred with Morgan Freeman in the Broadway debut “8,” a staged reenactment of
the federal trial that overturned California’s Prop 8 ban on same-sex marriage. She also joined
the cast of the Tony Award-winning play “God of Carnage,” replacing Marcia Gay Harden in the
role. In Los Angeles, she earned a Drama Desk nomination for her role in “Three Hotels” and
was also seen in the Geffen Playhouse’s “Love, Loss, and What I Wore.”
Currently, Lahti can be seen as Sheryl in CBS’s “Evil.”
David Horn
Executive Producer, Great Performances
Director for Television, Great Performances – Gloria: A Life
Director, Performance & Arts Programming, THIRTEEN Productions LLC
Facebook: @GreatPerformances; Twitter: @GPerfPBS
As the executive producer of the Emmy Award-winning series Great Performances, David
Horn oversees the development, production and programming of WNET’s national performing
arts presentations on PBS. During his 39-year tenure with the series, Horn has twice received the
prestigious Peabody Award and has been nominated for a Primetime Emmy more than 25 times,
winning five. In 2015, he was honored with The Drama League’s Unique Contribution to the
Theater Award for his vital work in bringing New York theater to a larger audience across
America.
In addition to Great Performances, Horn is the creator and executive producer of the
Emmy Award-winning series NYC-Arts, a weekly magazine program hosted by Philippe de
Montebello and Paula Zahn that features the dynamic arts and culture scene in New York City.
Horn is also the creator, executive producer and director of Theater Close-Up, a series dedicated
to showcasing the innovative productions of New York City’s Off- and Off-Off-Broadway
theaters. Horn has also directed several productions in a new collaboration between WNET and
the subscription streaming service BroadwayHD, including the historic first live stream of the
Broadway musical She Loves Me, followed by Noël Coward’s Present Laughter, starring Kevin
Kline, Paula Vogel’s critically acclaimed play Indecent and Irving Berlin’s Holiday Inn.After his successful productions of King Lear, Cyrano de Bergerac and Macbeth, all of
which were recognized with Best Actor Emmy nominations for Sir Ian McKellen, Kevin Kline
and Sir Patrick Stewart, respectively, Horn continued his commitment to incorporate
Shakespeare into the Great Performances repertoire. In 2015, Horn served as executive
producer alongside Sam Mendes and Gareth Naeme for the series The Hollow Crown.
Produced as film adaptations of Shakespeare’s history plays, The Hollow Crown featured
Jeremy Irons, Tom Hiddleston and Ben Whishaw, and was followed by The Wars of the
Roses, starring Tom Sturridge as Henry VI, Benedict Cumberbatch as Richard III and an all-
star cast, including Sophie Okonedo, Judi Dench and Hugh Bonneville. In summer 2019, he
directed the first Great Performances live recording from The Public Theater’s Free
Shakespeare in Park since 1974, Kenny Leon’s modern production of Much Ado About Nothing,
featuring an all-black cast, including Danielle Brooks.
Horn’s extensive catalog of original productions includes creating In the Spotlight
(1993), a series of primetime popular music specials, and executive producing Sessions at West
54th; he was honored with the ASCAP Deems Taylor Award for both in recognition of excellence
in music broadcast programming. He was also the executive producer of two landmark
miniseries for PBS: Make ‘Em Laugh: The Funny Business of America in 2009 and Broadway:
The American Musical, which garnered the Primetime Emmy for Non-Fiction Series in 2005.
Horn has produced numerous classical music concerts from Carnegie Hall, as well as
internationally in Vienna, Salzburg, Rome and Paris. He has also played an instrumental role in
producing a variety of regional operas, many of them world premieres, in San Francisco, Santa
Fe, Los Angeles, Dallas and Houston, where he won an Emmy for John Adams’ Nixon in China.
Horn’s multi-camera directing credits for Great Performances include the recent
Bernstein Centennial from Tanglewood, four GRAMMY Salute to Music Legends specials, the
Joan Baez 75th Birthday Celebration, Tony Bennett & Lady Gaga: Cheek to Cheek LIVE!, Steve
Martin & Edie Brickell in Concert, Great Performances 40th Anniversary Celebration, multiple
Andrea Bocelli concerts including his Central Park event, Pete Seeger’s 90th Birthday
Celebration at MSG, Chess in Concert, Hitman: David Foster & Friends, We Love Ella!: A
Tribute to the First Lady of Song, South Pacific at Carnegie Hall, Michael Bublé: Caught in the
Act, Josh Groban Live at the Greek and many others. From 1981 to 1983, Horn produced the
series In Performance at the White House.
###PBS Winter 2020 Press Tour
Panel Biographies
Asian Americans
Premieres May 2020 on PBS (check local listings)
Hari Kondabolu, series participant
Hari Kondabolu is a comedian, writer & podcaster based
in Brooklyn, N.Y. He has been described by The New
York Times as “one of the most exciting political comics
in stand-up today.” In 2018, his Netflix special Warn
Your Relatives was released, and he was named one of
Variety’s Top 10 Comics To Watch. Hari has released
two comedy albums, “Waiting for 2042” and “Mainstream
American Comic,” with the legendary indie rock label Kill
Rock Stars. He has performed on The Late Show with
David Letterman, Conan, Jimmy Kimmel Live, John Oliver’s NY Stand-Up Show, @Midnight and has his
own half-hour special on Comedy Central. He is a former writer & correspondent on the Chris Rock
produced FX TV show Totally Biased with W. Kamau Bell. In 2017, he released his critically acclaimed
documentary The Problem with Apu on truTV. Hari is a regular on the public radio gameshow “Wait Wait,
Don’t Tell Me.” Hari has also appeared on such notable radio shows and podcasts as “Fresh Air with
Terry Gross,”” WTF with Marc Maron,” ‘2 Dope Queens,” “Morning Edition,” “All Things Considered,” “A
Prairie Home Companion,” “Wits,” “Studio 360,’ and “Bullseye.” He co-hosted the popular “Politically
Reactive” podcast with W. Kamau Bell and currently co-hosts “The Kondabolu Brothers Podcast” with his
brother Ashok on Earwolf. Hari attended both Bowdoin College and Wesleyan University, graduating
from the former institution with a B.A. in Comparative Politics in 2004. A former immigrant rights
organizer in Seattle, Hari also earned a Masters in Human Rights from the London School of Economics
in 2008. He was NYU’s APA Institute’s “Artist in Residence” for the 2014-2015 academic year. Hari was
born and raised in Queens, N.Y. He went to Townsend Harris High School, and the school’s mascot,
“Hari the Hawk,” was named after him during his senior year. (He sometimes fears that his greatest
achievement.)Grace Lee, producer/director
Grace is an independent producer, director and writer
working in both narrative and non-fiction film. She directed
the Peabody Award-winning documentary American
Revolutionary: The Evolution of Grace Lee Boggs, which The
Hollywood Reporter called “an entertainingly revealing
portrait of the power of a single individual to effect change.”
The film won six audience awards before the broadcast on
the PBS documentary series POV. Her previous
documentary The Grace Lee Project on the Sundance
Channel also won multiple awards. Other credits include the
Emmy-nominated MAKERS: Women In Politics and Off The
Menu: Asian America, both for PBS. She has been a
Sundance Institute Fellow, a 2017 Chicken & Egg
Breakthrough Award winner, an envoy of the American Film
Showcase, and is co-founder of the Asian American
Documentary Network (A-Doc). She is also a member of the
Documentary Branch of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts
and Sciences. She is currently a producer/director on the
five-part landmark PBS series Asian Americans as well as
And She Could Be Next, a new documentary project about
women of color transforming politics and civic engagement.
Renee Tajima-Peña, producer
Renee Tajima-Peña is an Academy Award-nominated
filmmaker whose work focuses on communities of color,
immigration, gender, and social justice. Her previous films
include Who Killed Vincent Chin?, MY AMERICA...or Honk
if You Love Buddha, Labor Women, The New Americans:
Mexico Story, Calavera Highway and No Más Bebés. She
also directs the multi-media Minecraft-based interactive
teaching project, Building History 3.0. Her films have
screened at the Cannes, Hong Kong, New Directors/New
Films, SXSW, Sundance and Toronto international film
festivals and the Whitney Biennial. She has been awarded
the Guggenheim Fellowship, USA Broad Fellowship, Alpert
Award in the Arts for Film/Video, a Peabody and a duPont-
Columbia Award. Tajima-Peña teaches social
documentary at UCLA, where she is a professor of Asian American Studies, the director of the Center for
EthnoCommunications and holds an endowed chair in Japanese American Studies. She was the
founding faculty of the UC Santa Cruz Graduate Program in Social Documentation and the inaugural
Filmmaker-in-Residence of the International Documentary Association. Tajima-Peña has a long history of
media and community and student activism.Tamlyn Tomita, actress and series narrator
Tamlyn Tomita is an Okinawan/Japanese/Filipina-
American actress. She made her screen debut in The
Karate Kid Part II and has appeared in leading and
supporting roles in the films Come See the Paradise, The
Joy Luck Club, Picture Bride, and Four Rooms. She can
currently be seen as Allegra Aoki in ABC's The Good
Doctor. Tamlyn has played in independent films and
other foreign and Hollywood productions such as The
Day After Tomorrow, The Eye, Tekken, the Brazilian
drama Gaijin 2: Love Me as I Am, Robot Stories, Only the
Brave, Real Artists, The Ningyo, First World Problems,
The Unbidden, Daddy and Operation: Marriage. Over her
career, Tamlyn has also appeared in several TV
productions including: Quantum Leap; Living Single;
Highlander; Murder, She Wrote; Chicago Hope, Will & Grace, The Shield, Strong Medicine, The
Mentalist, Women's Murder Club; Monk; Private Practice; Zoo; CSI: Miami; Touch; Criminal Minds;
NCIS: Los Angeles; Bones; and Counterpart, among other dramas and comedies. She has also
appeared in recurring roles on the soap operas Santa Barbara, General Hospital and Days of Our Lives.
She has had recurring roles on shows including: Crossing Jordan, 24, Eureka, Heroes, Glee,
Resurrection, Chasing Life, True Blood, How to Get Away with Murder, and most recently, Amazon's The
Man in the High Castle. A series regular appearing on the The Burning Zone; and the Epix drama series
Berlin Station, Tamlyn will be seen in two yet-to-be announced series in winter/spring 2020.EXPEDITION WITH STEVE BACKSHALL
TCA Winter 2020 Panelist Bios
Steve Backshall, host and explorer
One of television’s busiest presenters, BAFTA Award-winning wildlife expert Steve
Backshall has been passionate about the wild world ever since he could crawl. Steve
is hugely popular with young television audiences, who are both terrified and
delighted to watch his encounters with extraordinary and inspiring predators. Steve
is an old-fashioned action hero whose leisure pursuits include mountaineering,
kayaking, scuba diving, martial arts and endurance running, which, together with his
unsurpassed wildlife knowledge, make him a compelling and motivational speaker
for a multitude of audiences.
Steve's most recent credits include “Wild Alaska Live” (BBC One, PBS), “Hedgehog
A&E” (Channel 5), “Down The Mighty River with Steve Backshall” (BBC Two), “Extreme Mountain
Challenge” (BBC Two), “Fierce” (ITV), “Big Blue Live” (BBC One, PBS) live from Monterey, California,
and “Strictly Come Dancing” (BBC One). Steve also fronts the CBBC Deadly series, travelling the world
to film “Deadly Pole to Pole,” “Deadly 60,” “Live and Deadly,” “Deadly 360,” “Deadly on a Mission,” and
most recently, “Backshall’s Deadly Adventures.” Other credits include “Lost Land of the Tiger” (BBC One),
“Lost Land of the Volcano” (BBC One), “Lost Land of the Jaguar” (BBC One), “Expedition Borneo” (BBC
One), “Expedition Alaska” (Discovery), “Britain’s Lost World,” “Extreme Caving,” “Inside Out,” “The One
Show,” “The Nature of Britain” and “The Really Wild Show.”
In 2011, Steve was recognized with a BAFTA Award for The Best Children’s Television Presenter for his
work on “Deadly 60,” as well as the series itself being honored with a BAFTA for The Best Factual Series.
Steve was also an on-air correspondent for the PBS and BBC co-production BIG BLUE LIVE, which won
the BAFTA for a Live Event in 2016.
Steve is also a prolific author, having published 13 books, and is a proud ambassador for The Scouts
and the Get Outside champion for Ordinance Survey.
Bill Margol, Senior Director, General Audience Programming &
Development, PBS
Bill Margol has spent over 30 years working in the media industry, covering the
ground of writer, producer, editor, developer and executive. A graduate of Syracuse
University's S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications and Loyola
University’s Masters in Emerging Media program, Bill was Executive Producer of
Special Projects at Sci-Fi Channel, overseeing specials, documentaries, stunts and
events from 1993-1998. He joined TNT in Atlanta as Director of Production in 1998,
and in 2003, joined Travel Channel as VP of Production, where he was responsible
for the launch of such groundbreaking series as “Anthony Bourdain: No
Reservations.” In 2008, Bill joined National Geographic Television as VP
Development, where he created the Emmy-nominated series "Brain Games.”
In 2014, Bill joined PBS as Sr. Director of Programming & Development, and has overseen such
programs as the Emmy-winning documentary A YEAR IN SPACE, the groundbreaking series WE’LL
MEET AGAIN WITH ANN CURRY, as well as programming such as 8 DAYS: TO THE MOON AND
BACK, BIG BLUE LIVE, IN THEIR OWN WORDS, LIFE FROM ABOVE, BEYOND A YEAR IN SPACE,
GENIUS: WITH STEPHEN HAWKING and WILD ALASKA LIVE.WINTER 2020 TCA
INDEPENDENT LENS
ONE CHILD NATION
Panelist Bios
Lois Vossen
Series Executive Producer
Lois Vossen is the founding Executive Producer for the PBS primetime series INDEPENDENT
LENS. Vossen is responsible for commissioning new films, programming the series and working
with filmmakers on editorial and broadcast issues. INDEPENDENT LENS films have received
over 20 Emmy Awards, 16 George Foster Peabody Awards, five Alfred I. duPont-Columbia
Journalism Awards and eight Academy Award nominations. The series was honored in 2013,
2014, 2015 and 2017 with the International Documentary Association (IDA) Award for Best
Curated Series.
Nanfu Wang
Director/Producer Cinematographer/Editor
Nanfu Wang is an Emmy-nominated and Peabody Award-winning filmmaker based in New York
City. Wang’s feature debut, Hooligan Sparrow, was shortlisted for the 2017 Academy Award for
Best Documentary Feature. Since its premiere at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival, it has won
over 20 awards internationally including a Peabody Award, a Cinema Eye Honor award, the
George Polk Award, an IDA Documentary Award, and an Independent Spirit Award. Her second
feature documentary, I Am Another You, premiered at the SXSW Film Festival in 2017 where it
won two special jury awards, opened theatrically in September 2017, and premiered on
INDEPENDENT LENS in 2018.
Brian Stuy
Co-Founder of Research-China/Film Subject
Brian Stuy is the owner and founder of Research-China. He and his wife Long Lan have three
daughters from China: Meikina from DianBai, Meigon from Guangzhou, and Meilan from
Luoyang. After discovering that documentation for one of their adopted children was fake, Brian
and his wife created the organization with the mission of reuniting adopted children with their
families in China through DNA testing. Brian has been actively involved in FCC (Families with
Children from China) for a number of years and has served as president of the chapter.
Additionally, he has had numerous articles regarding adoption research appear in Adoption
Today Magazine and various FCC publications.
Aside from the research on China adoptions he began in 2001, Brian has extensive experience
in research. His study of Utah Mormon history has been published in such journals as Dialogue,
Sunstone, and Journal of Mormon History. He has had articles published in several anthologies,and his five-volume work on Mormon history from 1886-1898 has seen multiple reprints and is frequently used as source material by Utah historians and writers. Longlan Stuy Co-Founder of Research-China/Film Subject Long Lan Stuy is Research-China's in-country guide and translator. She has worked with Brian Stuy since the inception of the organization, and previously owned "Long Lan's Place" on Shamian Island from 1996 until her marriage to Brian. She shares her vast knowledge and love of her home country with each family who works with Research-China, and is passionate about assisting the children who remain in China's orphanages.
Press Contacts:
Ava Tews, WNET , 212-560-8153, tewsa@wnet.org
Press Materials: http://pbs.org/pressroom or http://thirteen.org/pressroom
Websites: http://pbs.org/milesdavis, http://facebook.com/americanmasters, @PBSAmerMasters,
http://youtube.com/AmericanMastersPBS, http://instagram.com/pbsamericanmasters #MilesDavisPBS
American Masters — Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool
Premieres nationwide Tuesday, February 25 at 9 p.m. on PBS (check local listings),
pbs.org/milesdavis and the PBS Video app in honor of Black History Month
TCA Panelist Bios
Stanley Nelson
Director and producer, American Masters — Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool
@StanleyNelson1
Stanley Nelson is one of the foremost chroniclers of the African American experience working in
nonfiction film today. His films, many of which have aired on PBS, combine compelling
narratives with deeply researched historical detail, shining new light on both familiar and under-
explored aspects of the American past. Nelson, a MacArthur “Genius” Fellow, has received
numerous honors over the course of his career, including five Primetime Emmy Awards and
Lifetime Achievement Awards from the National Academy of Television Arts Sciences, the
Emmys, the Peabodys and IDA. In 2013, Nelson received the National Humanities Medal from
President Barack Obama.
His latest film, the Grammy-nominated American Masters — Miles Davis: Birth
of the Cool, premiered at Sundance Film Festival in January 2019. Past films include Boss: The
Black Experience in Business; Tell Them We Are Rising: The Story of Black Colleges andUniversities and NAACP Image Award-winning The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the
Revolution, both for Independent Lens; three-time Emmy Award winner Freedom Riders and
Peabody Award winner Freedom Summer.
In 2000, Nelson, along with his wife, Marcia A. Smith, founded Firelight Media, a
nonprofit production company dedicated to using historical film to advance contemporary social
justice causes, and to mentoring, inspiring and training a new generation of diverse young
filmmakers committed to telling underrepresented stories.
Erin Davis
Son of Miles Davis
@erindavisMDP
Erin Davis, son of late jazz icon Miles Davis, is a Los Angeles-based musician, producer and
composer who runs Miles Davis Properties, LLC along with his sister Cheryl Davis and cousin
Vince Wilburn. He also toured and recorded with Miles Davis. He is a regular participant on
industry panels, including at the GRAMMY Museum and SXSW; he partnered with Apple for
their “Meet The Musicians” series; and he is co-host of the annual Miles Davis House event at
SXSW with Wilburn. Additionally, he is an executive producer for Miles Davis Properties, LLC
on the GRAMMY-nominated documentary American Masters – Miles Davis: Birth of the
Cool and was a producer on the feature film “Miles Ahead” starring Don Cheadle and Ewan
McGregor. His credits include producing the original music for the Richard Pryor documentary
“Omit the Logic,” which won a NAACP Award for Best Documentary; “Caught in the Cross Fire”
starring 50 Cent; and others. Previously, Davis was a drummer for the EMI Records recording
group Bloodline, an all-star rock group featuring the offspring of famous musicians, including
GRAMMY-nominated blues-rock guitarist Joe Bonamassa.
Vince Wilburn
Nephew of Miles Davis
@NefofMiles
Vince Wilburn, nephew of late jazz icon Miles Davis, oversees Miles Davis Properties, LLC, along
with Erin Davis (son of Davis) and Cheryl Davis (daughter of Davis). Wilburn is a highly
accomplished drummer, bandleader, producer and radio host, who both toured and recorded
with Miles Davis on many legendary recordings from 1984 through 1987, including the
GRAMMY Award-winning album “AURA,” which he co-produced; “Decoy,” which he also co-
produced; “You’re Under Arrest;” and the 2008 GRAMMY-nominated “Miles From India,”
which hit No. 8 on the Billboard jazz charts. Wilburn also toured internationally with the All-Star
“Miles From India” ensemble to sold-out crowds.He is bandleader and drummer for Miles Electric Band, performing to sold-out crowds
both domestically and internationally.
Wilburn was influential in putting together the record-breaking release “Everything Is
Beautiful” — a reimagined project produced by Robert Glasper that charted at No. 1 for Jazz, No.
10 for Hip Hop and No. 5 for Top Current R&B. He is an executive producer for Miles Davis
Properties, LLC on the GRAMMY-nominated documentary American Masters – Miles
Davis: Birth of the Cool and was a producer on the feature film “Miles Ahead.”
Marcus Miller
Bassist and Miles Davis collaborator
@MarcusMiller959
Marcus Miller has been a force in the music industry for over 40 years. He has composed classics
for Aretha Franklin, Luther Vandross and David Sanborn, to name a few. Miller’s relationship
with Miles Davis began at the age of 21 when he became a member of Davis’ 1981 comeback band
following Davis’ five-year hiatus. Within a few years, Miller became a crucial influence in Davis’
career, composing, producing and arranging three albums that helped define the sound of Davis’
final era, including the album “Tutu.” The title piece, written for Bishop Desmond Tutu, is often
described as one of the most significant contributions to the contemporary jazz canon.
Miller is an UNESCO Artist for Peace and spokesperson for the Slave Routes Project,
work that inspired his GRAMMY-nominated release “Afrodeezia,” followed by “Laid Black,” also
nominated for a GRAMMY in 2018. Miller is also a film composer, tours worldwide and has been
the host of “Miller Time” on SiriusXM radio for nearly a decade.
Michael Kantor
American Masters Executive Producer
@MKantorfilm
Michael Kantor joined American Masters as the series’ executive producer in April 2014 and
founded its theatrical imprint, American Masters Pictures, in January 2016. American Masters
Pictures premiered three films at Sundance Film Festival in 2019: Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool,
N. Scott Momaday: Words from a Bear and Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am; other Sundance
premieres include Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You, Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise
(Peabody Award) and Richard Linklater – Dream is Destiny. Recent programs include Sammy
Davis, Jr.: I’ve Gotta Be Me, Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr Story, Itzhak and Raúl Juliá: The
World’s a Stage. An Emmy- and Peabody Award-winning filmmaker, Kantor’s PBS series
include Broadway: The American Musical (hosted by Julie Andrews), Make ‘Em Laugh (hosted
by Billy Crystal) and Superheroes (hosted by Liev Schreiber), and he co-wrote the companion
books for each series. He served as executive producer of Give Me the Banjo with Steve Martinand distributes the American Film Theatre series, including Edward Albee’s A Delicate Balance,
starring Katharine Hepburn, and Chekhov’s Three Sisters with Laurence Olivier. Kantor serves
as a Tony nominator and oversees the American Masters Podcast.
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