Middlemarch Films

Director and Producer Credits

MEDICATING NORMAL. Producer (with Lynn Cunningham & Wendy Ractliffe). A feature-length documentary combining cinema verite and journalism. The the untold story of the disastrous consequences that can occur when profit-driven medicine intersects with human beings in distress. Released 2020.

THE OPERA HOUSE. Consulting Producer. A feature-length documentary about the need to find a new home for the Metropolitan Opera which led to the creation of Lincoln Center. Premiere, New York Film Festival. PBS 2018.

MAKING ROUNDS. Producer/Director. A documentary following two doctors on the cardiac critical care unit of a hospital. Theatrical release, 2016.

MYSTERY OF MATTER. Director (with Stephen Lyons). A three-hour history of chemistry (from alchemy through Glenn Seaborg) Funded by the National Science Foundation. PBS broadcast 2016. News and Documentary Emmy, PBS 2015.

THE LOST BIRD PROJECT. Producer. A one-hour film about extinction. A public television Earth Day special, 2013. 2014, 2015.

GREY GARDENS. Director & Editor (directed with the Maysles brothers and Ellen Hovde; edited with Hovde and Susan Froemke.). A highly acclaimed theatrically released documentary, the film looks at the lives of Edith Bouvier Beale and her daughter, Edie, the aunt and cousin of Jacqueline Onassis. Once a beautiful and much sought-after debutante, little Edie never married and now, at age 56, still lives with her mother and at least thirty cats in a dilapidated mansion in East Hampton. The film was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation in the United States National Film Registry as being “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant”. Selected for Cannes, New York, London, and Edinburgh Film Festivals, 1976. PBS (numerous times).

LIBERTY! THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). A PBS mini-series. Beginning in 1763 and ending with the ratification of the US Constitution, this six-hour series was awarded a George Foster Peabody Award for Excellence in Broadcast Journalism, a Christopher Award, and was nominated for Best Documentary by the Directors Guild. Companion book chosen as Book-Of-The-Month Club Main Selection. Soundtrack release by Sony Classical. First broadcast 1997.

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). A three-part miniseries & winner of the Prime Time Emmy (Non-fiction Film of Exceptional Merit). Starring Richard Easton and Dylan Baker. Broadcast on PBS 2002.

ALEXANDER HAMILTON. Producer/Director. A two-hour program for The American Experience, starring Brian O’Byrne. Broadcast on PBS 2007

DOLLEY MADISON. Producer/Director. A 90-minute program for PBS, starring Eve Best. Grants received from the National Endowment for the Humanities, PBS and others. Broadcast on PBS, 2010.

SAVING THE NATIONAL TREASURES. Producer/Director. A WGBH/NOVA Special, filmed over the course of 5 years, following the process of restoring and creating new state-of-the-art cases for the Declaration of Independence and Constitution. A short version also showing at The National Archives in Washington, DC. Broadcast 2005.

AN EMPIRE OF REASON. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). A docu-drama about the debate surrounding New York State’s ratification of the United States Constitution, the program stars Walter Cronkite, John Chancellor, William F. Buckley, Jr., Phil Donahue, Robert MacNeil, Charlayne Hunter-Gault, Forrest Sawyer, Andrea Mitchell and more. Governors Mario Cuomo, Tom Kean, and Mayor Ed Koch make cameo appearances. Emmy. Cine Gold Eagle, Best of Festival, Athens Film Festival. Gold Camera, U.S. Film Festival. Broadcast on Public Television 1988.
BEHIND THE SCENES. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). A 10-part series on the arts for public television. Aimed at 8 to 12-year-olds, the series featured David Hockney, Julie Taymor, Max Roach, Matt Groening and many others. Major funding for this ground-breaking series was provided by The National Endowment for the Arts, The MacArthur Foundation, and McDonalds. Winner of numerous awards and prizes including the prestigious Japan Prize (“Best of Festival” in the largest international children’s film festival). Broadcast on PBS 1992.

SIX AMERICAN FAMILIES: THE BURKS OF GEORGIA. Producer/Director (with the Maysles brothers and Ellen Hovde). The filmmakers spend several weeks with a poor white family, with thirteen children, living in rural Georgia. Produced by Group W/Westinghouse. Columbia-DuPont Award for Excellence in Broadcast Journalism. Broadcast on PBS 1997.

AMERICAN PHOTOGRAPHY – A CENTURY OF IMAGES. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). A three-hour series for PBS, about the impact of photography on America in the 20th century. Christopher Award. Broadcast 1999.

THE CRASH OF 1929. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). A one-hour program for THE AMERICAN EXPERIENCE (PBS), the film traces the economic boom, the “New Era” of prosperity, that ends with the great stock market crash of 1929. First broadcast 1990 (re-broadcast multiple times…whenever the market crashes).

THE NEW MEDICINE. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde), A two-hour special for PBS. Winner of the Freddie (International Health and Medical Media award). Hosted by Dana Reeve, the program explores the recent science showing the concrete effects that emotions can have on health, and explores the implications of this for the practice of medicine. Broadcast 2006.

HEALTH IS WEALTH. Producer/Director. A short film about the global health crisis, featuring Bono and Kofi Annan, made for Bill Moyers and The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. 2007.

TWYLA ON TWYLA. Producer/Director. Middlemarch’s third film with choreographer, Twyla Tharp. Exhibited as part of a show at the LA County Museum. 2004.

DOGS: THE EARLY YEARS. Producer/Director. A one-hour film about puppies, narrated by John Ritter, for the PBS series, NATURE. Broadcast 2004.

DANCING: SEX AND SOCIAL DANCE / THE INDIVIDUAL & TRADITION. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). Two one-hour films for a major Public Television series on world dance. “The Individual and Tradition” follows Twyla Tharp as she creates a dance with New York City Ballet dancers, Damian Woetzel Susan Jaffee, and others. “Sex and Social Dance” looks at social dance in the United States, the South Pacific and Morocco. The film shows how cultural attitudes about coupling and gender are reflected in the way men and women dance with one another. (Co-production with the BBC; aired in Britain, Germany and the U.S. Broadcast on PBS 1993.

100 YEARS…100 MOVIES. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). One film in the ten-hour series, featuring Woody Allen, James Earl Jones, Dustin Hoffman, narrated by James Woods, hosted by Sally Field. Sponsored by the American Film Institute. Aired on TNT. 1998.

GOING BROKE IN AMERICA. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). A two-hour documentary which explores poverty, debt, and living on the margin. The film follows the lives of several families who are in serious debt and struggling – sometimes unsuccessfully – to avoid bankruptcy. 1999.

WRITERS WRITING. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). A one-hour documentary which follows Washington Post reporter, Courtland Malloy, as he covers the story of mass evictions in Washington, DC. Broadcast on PBS 1986.

NICHOLS AND DIMES. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). In this film about the “ins and outs” of business investment, Mike Nichols’ very successful Arabian horse business is portrayed as example. Broadcast on CBS Cable 1982.

EARTH EXPLORER. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). A one-hour documentary which follows geophysicist, Marcia McNutt, as she investigates the break-up of the North American continent. Part of a science mini-series which aired on PBS in the spring of 1995. Numerous awards.

THE HACKERSTAR NEGOTATION. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). A film designed for businessmen, bankers and lawyers about the art of negotiation. The program follows a protracted negotiation led by Roger Fisher of the Harvard Negotiation Project. Sponsored by Morgan Guaranty Trust and the Harvard Negotiation Project. 1985.

HERE’S MY QUESTION: WHERE DOES MY GARBAGE GO? Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). A lively, entertaining film for children about garbage and recycling, with animation by New Yorker cartoonist, Ed Koren and music by Sesame Street composers. Numerous awards including the Oppenheimer Platinum Award. 1995.

SESAME STREET and 3-2-1 CONTACT. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). We have produced over thirty short documentaries for these two shows. They have aired continuously over the last twenty years and were among the few films selected to appear in a retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art. Some are classics which continue to be shown today, including “Me and My Llama” (Llama goes to the dentist) and “Record” (singer-songwriter, Paul Simon, shows his young son how a record is made), and two films featuring Linus Pauling. 1977-1984.

ENORMOUS CHANGES AT THE LAST MINUTE. Director (with Ellen Hovde). A feature film for ABC. Based on stories by Grace Paley and written by John Sayles, the film stars Ellen Barkin, David Strathairn and Kevin Bacon. Released theatrically 1982. Selected for London and Toronto film festivals.

MR. PREBLE GETS RID OF HIS WIFE. Producer/Director (with Ellen Hovde). A short humorous drama based on the James Thurber short story, the film aired on HBO, PBS and the BBC. Red Ribbon, American Film Festival. Cine Gold Eagle. 1989.

Editing Credits

WOODSTOCK (asst Editor) Feature film for Warner Brothers, 1969

GROOVE TUBE (Editor) Feature film released theatrically (and the inspiration for SNL) 1974

LORDS OF FLATBUSH (Editor) Feature film released theatrically in 1974

GILDA LIVE (Editor with Lynzee Klingman & Ellen Hovde), directed by Mike Nichols and released theatrically 1980.

Middlemarch’s Corporate & Educational Films

Morgan Stanley, Sullivan & Cromwell, Johnson and Johnson, Corning Glassworks, Kodak, Scholastic, Macmillan, and others.