| Stanley Nelson, one of our award winning filmmakers, receives MacArthur Fellowship. |
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New York-based documentarian Stanley Nelson, producer of American Experience's upcoming "Emmett Till," has been named recipient of a MacArthur Fellowship. Nelson received word of the prestigious grant while on a location shoot in Mississippi." The MacArthur Fellowship will give me time to think through new projects, like the series we have in development on the economic history of the transatlantic slave trade," said Nelson. "I really hope that getting this kind of recognition will help more people appreciate the importance of documentary film, and will encourage other documentary filmmakers, who are so often left wondering if their work has any impact." Nelson's 60-minute documentary is the story of a young African American boy from Chicago who was brutally killed for whistling at a white woman while visiting relatives in Money, Mississippi. The murder and corrupt trial that followed horrified the nation and sparked the civil rights movement. "Emmett Till" will air on PBS's American Experience January 20, 2003. "Stanley is a treasure," says Margaret Drain, executive producer of American Experience. "His work is about race, and his approach is unique. In every film he tries to peel away the layers-to move beyond the predictable, to expose the common human traits we all share, and he does it with great sensitivity and skill." Nelson is the only filmmaker to receive the MacArthur grant this year, and the eleventh in the Fellowship's history. American Experience is a production of WGBH Boston. For more information, call Daphne B. Noyes at 617-300-5344. |