Conversations on documentary filmmaking with the people who actually make the films, from Ken Burns and PBS American Masters creator Susan Lacy to first-time directors finishing their first film. Documentary First is a weekly podcast for working and aspiring documentary filmmakers who want honest, in-depth conversations about how documentaries get funded, made, and seen.
Hosted by Christian Taylor, award-winning director of The Girl Who Wore Freedom (25+ international awards; distributed by Virgil Films, Swank, and Canal+), the show draws on 270+ interviews with documentary directors, editors, producers, distributors, and composers across HBO, Netflix, PBS, and the independent documentary world. Guests have included Emmy and Peabody Award-winning editor Charles Olivier (HBO’s The Jinx) and Emmy-nominated director Nick Bruckman (Netflix’s Minted).
Two formats, one feed. The main show features long-form documentary interviews on how filmmakers approach their craft, navigate distribution, and build careers, with practical filmmaking tips you can use. On alternating weeks, Documentary First: The Deep Dive takes one insight from a recent conversation and follows it further, drawing on psychology, philosophy, and real-world experience.
Topics include documentary directing, documentary producing, documentary editing, documentary distribution, documentary funding, documentary storytelling, film festival strategy, archival footage and rights clearance, entertainment law for filmmakers, and building a sustainable career in nonfiction filmmaking.
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What can a few seconds of a stranger's home movie do for your documentary?
Archival footage does not have to come from the National Archives or a big footage house. Home movies, the 8mm and Super 8 reels families shot from the 1930s through the 1980s, show ordinary life the way it actually looked: the clothes, the cars, the Christmases. For a documentary filmmaker, home movie footage carries a texture and an emotion that narration cannot supply, and it does it in a few seconds.
In Episode 287, Christian sits down with Phil Maher, founder of Stockfilm, a home movie archive with over 200,000 clips. A software engineer by training, Phil started in 2015 by digitizing his grandfather's 8mm reels of his father's big Irish Catholic family in Chicago. He kept collecting reels from families and built a library of archival footage that filmmakers can search and license. Stockfilm keeps every scratch and flaw on purpose, and it keeps the physical reel after every scan.
Phil walks through how a reel becomes a licensable 4K clip: cleaning, splicing, scanning, and dating footage with no label by reading the cars and clothes in the frame. He explains vinegar syndrome and why one decaying reel can damage the reels stored beside it. Christian and Phil take on footage houses that charge for public domain Signal Corps film, talk about what decades of home movies reveal about how people smoked, danced and smiled for the camera, and draw a firm line on AI. Stockfilm uses it to search and catalog the archive, never to change a frame. As Phil puts it, "We can prove every frame that we have, because we have it." Christian also shares 1947 home movies of Carentan, Normandy, shot by the father of Yves Marchais, whose story is at the center of her film in production, Heroes of Carentan.
The conversation turns to physical film versus cloud storage, and Christian brings up the Nine PBS case. In March 2026, the St. Louis public television station lost access to more than 50 terabytes of its archive, 70 years of its history, when its cloud storage vendor cut off access and appeared to go out of business. As of August 2026, a Denver judge had ruled that the station owns the data and set up a court-supervised process to retrieve it. It backs up Phil's point that the cloud can go away, because you do not really own it.
In this episode, you'll learn:
Why home movies give a documentary emotion that narration can't
How one family's 8mm reels became a searchable archive
How an unlabeled reel gets dated from cars, clothing and AI
What vinegar syndrome is, and why it spreads between reels
Why you should keep the physical reel after digitizing it
Why paying for Signal Corps footage can mean paying for something free
Where AI belongs in archival work, and why AI recreations should be labeled
Why physical media belongs in a real backup plan
CHAPTERS
0:00 A Grandfather's 8mm Became Stockfilm
9:28 Racing to Save Fading Film
13:18 How Do You Date Unlabeled Reels?
18:38 What Is Vinegar Syndrome?
20:56 Is Public Domain Footage Free?
23:36 Why Home Movies Move Audiences
27:18 Smoking, Dancing, Forgetting to Smile
32:34 AI in Documentary Filmmaking
35:02 Cloud or Physical Media?
39:08 Donating Your Family Archive
42:44 Dawson City: Frozen Time
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Why use home movies as archival footage in a documentary?
Home movies capture ordinary life the way it actually looked, scratches and all. Stockfilm founder Phil Maher says filmmakers turn to them when they want texture and emotion, something real that doesn't need narration to explain it. In his words, "A few seconds of just showing someone a place and time can really just get people into that spot and really create that moment that connects with the audience."
Where can I find free archival footage for a documentary?
Much U.S. government footage, including World War II Signal Corps film, is free through the National Archives and the Library of Congress. Christian Taylor points out that commercial footage houses often charge download and license fees for that same public domain material. Doing the research yourself takes longer, but it can save an independent film real money.
How do you date old home movie footage with no label?
Start with the clues inside the frame. Phil Maher of Stockfilm explains that cars are one of the best markers, because a shot can't predate the model year of a car that appears in it. Clothing narrows it further. Today AI image recognition helps suggest dates and keywords, but the footage itself is never altered.
What is vinegar syndrome in old film?
Vinegar syndrome is the breakdown of acetate safety film, the stock used for most 8mm and Super 8 home movies. As it degrades, the film gives off a vinegar smell, warps, shrinks and dries out. Phil Maher warns it can spread almost like a mold to reels stored nearby, so separate affected film and keep it away from heat and humidity.
Should documentaries label AI-generated historical footage?
Yes, according to Phil Maher. Stockfilm uses AI to search and catalog its archive but never to alter the footage, because the footage is the historical record. If a filmmaker uses AI to recreate a historical battle or event, Maher says the audience needs to be told it is AI-created, a fictional rendition of what may or may not have happened.
DOCUVIEW DÉJÀ VU PICKS
Phil's pick: Dawson City: Frozen Time (2016), directed by Bill Morrison. In 1978, construction crews in Dawson City, Yukon, dug up more than 500 reels of silent-era film that had been buried in an old swimming pool under a hockey rink, preserved for decades by the permafrost.
Christian Taylor on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/meetchristiantaylor
ABOUT THE GUEST
Phil Maher
Founder, Stockfilm
Phil Maher holds a computer science degree from Illinois State University and spent his career as a software engineer, building websites as early as 1995 and moving into search engine optimization. He founded Stockfilm in 2015 and has spent more than a decade collecting, scanning and cataloging family reels.
Stockfilm licenses archival footage from a home movie archive of over 200,000 clips shot on 8mm and Super 8 film from the 1930s through the 1980s. Stockfilm keeps every physical reel after scanning, so the provenance of every frame can be proven. According to stockfilm.com, direct licenses are a flat $149 per 4K clip, royalty-free, worldwide and perpetual.
ABOUT DOCUMENTARY FIRST
Documentary First is a weekly podcast about the craft and business of documentary filmmaking, hosted by award-winning director Christian Taylor. Listen Notes ranks the show in the top 5 percent of all podcasts worldwide. Christian directed The Girl Who Wore Freedom, winner of more than 25 international awards, and is in post-production on Heroes of Carentan.
RESOURCES MENTIONED
National Archives:
How Do You Get a Documentary Made? Ask the Woman Who Co-Runs RKO
Season 6 · Episode 286
Thursday, September 10, 2026 • Duration 53:30
Do you have a documentary, or do you have a Wikipedia entry?
Somebody decides whether your documentary gets made. Sophia Dilley is one of those people. She runs Concord Originals, the division behind Stax: Soulsville U.S.A. on HBO, and she is Co-President of RKO, which Concord bought in June 2025 along with more than 5,000 titles including King Kong, Citizen Kane and It's a Wonderful Life. In this episode she gives away the three questions she asks before her team commits to anything.
In Episode 286, Christian sits down with Sophia Dilley, Executive Vice President of Concord Originals and Co-President of RKO, to talk about how a project gets chosen, how to reach out to someone far above you, and how music rights for film work when the budget you have is the only budget there is.
The spine of the conversation is a question Dilley asks before her team commits to anything: is this a Wikipedia story we're telling? If the whole thing is already available in twelve seconds of searching, there may not be a film in it. Around that sit her two other threshold questions, a working answer to why the documentary business feels impossible right now, and the plainest reassurance in the episode. "It's scary," she says. "It's scary for everybody." Along the way: a punk band that played CBGB's, a production designer father who left for set at four forty-five in the morning, Roger Deakins as a case study in how to write to someone you admire, and the difference between distribution rights and derivative rights, which is the thing almost everyone (including Christian!) got wrong about the RKO deal. If you have ever been told that music rights for film are impossible on an independent budget, she has a different answer.
In this episode, you'll learn:
What Concord actually acquired when it bought RKO, and why distribution rights and derivative rights are two entirely different things
The three questions Sophia Dilley asks before committing to any story
How to tell whether you have a film or a Wikipedia entry
The difference between sync and publishing, and why one song can mean two negotiations with two different companies
Beyond Banners: How to Make a Documentary With No Film School
Season 6 · Episode 285
Friday, August 21, 2026 • Duration 40:58
Who finishes your film if you can't?
Andre N. Jackson had never made a film. He had twenty years in technology and security, an idea that arrived while he was sitting in a barber's chair, and no way into the industry. He finished the film anyway, and he came on the show with three lessons for other filmmakers. Two more came out while we were talking.
In Episode 285, Christian sits down with first-time filmmaker Andre N. Jackson to talk about "Beyond Banners," his film about the basketball program at Gwynn Park High School in Prince George's County, Maryland. Over a twenty-year run the team reached twelve state championships and won more than any high school in the state. The film starts there and ends up somewhere else entirely.
Andre puts it plainly: "I actually learned about filmmaking through making a film." The spine of the conversation is what it takes to make a documentary when nothing is set up in your favor. Andre leaned on the research and analysis skills he built as an intelligence analyst, cold-called a Hall of Fame coach, funded it through a fiscal sponsor, used AI as a second brain, and kept going through two heart attacks in three days, the second while he was still in the hospital. Along the way the film became a story about stewardship, about the people who stayed, and about what the commercialization of youth sports is doing to community public schools.
In this episode, you'll learn:
How an idea that arrived in a barber's chair became a finished film with no film school behind it
Why twenty years as an intelligence analyst turned out to be a filmmaking advantage
Why Can't Your Documentary Find an Audience? l Deep Dive on Ep. 284
Thursday, August 13, 2026 • Duration 13:35
When did your audience stop being people and become a number?
Most independent films and podcasts do not fail because the work is bad. They fail because no one ever felt like they belonged to them. This Deep Dive is about how to build an audience for your documentary before it is ever released, and the one ingredient that decides whether people stay with what you make.
In this Deep Dive on Documentary First Episode 284 with Dutch filmmaker Jonathan de Jong, host Christian Taylor takes the idea at the heart of his film “Human Forever,” the most-watched human interest documentary in Dutch cinema history, and follows it somewhere unexpected: the same thing that makes dementia care humane is the thing that built his audience.
The spine of the episode is a single word, belonging. Jonathan says the most dangerous part of dementia is not the diagnosis, it is the feeling of not belonging. Christian tests that idea against her own father’s move into memory care this month, then turns it on filmmakers through Martin Buber’s 1923 book “I and Thou” and the difference between treating a person as an “It” and meeting them as a “Thou.” The through line: build belonging before you build buzz.
In this episode, Christian explores:
Why the feeling of not belonging is the most dangerous part of dementia, in Jonathan de Jong’s own words
The one ingredient that decides whether people stay with what you make
How Jonathan built an audience for “Human Forever” before a single frame was shot
Why building a movement beat marketing a film
What belonging looks like in one real room, on her father’s move day
Martin Buber’s “I and Thou” and the difference between an It and a Thou
How filmmaking goes wrong the moment your audience becomes a number
Why you invite people to belong instead of reaching for them
The question to ask about anyone you put in front of your camera
What a documentary about dementia can teach any filmmaker about reach
CHAPTERS
0:00 The Secret That Keeps an Audience
Ep. 284 I How to Fund a Documentary Without the Industry
Season 6 · Episode 284
Thursday, August 6, 2026 • Duration 51:49
How do you fund a documentary when the whole industry says no?
How do you fund a documentary without film funds, grants, or a commissioning broadcaster, and still reach a huge audience? Dutch filmmaker Jonathan de Jong did exactly that with Human Forever, the most-watched human interest documentary in Dutch cinema history. The government pulled his funding two and a half years into production, and he still finished the film, built a movement, and put it in cinemas around the world.
In Episode 284 of Documentary First, Christian Taylor sits down with Jonathan de Jong, director of Human Forever and founder of SUPER7EVEN Productions, to talk about how independent filmmakers actually fund, build an audience for, get access for, and produce a documentary that people see.
Jonathan's whole approach starts from one idea: build the audience before the film exists. He grew a following through a bestselling book, The Housemates, a touring theater show, and his protagonist, the young nurse Teun Toebes, before the movie ever premiered. He funds outside the traditional market by partnering with mission-aligned organizations, he earns fly-on-the-wall access by investing years of unhurried time, and he made a hard subject impossible to look away from. In his words, “we made dementia sexy.”
In this episode, you'll learn:
How to fund a documentary without relying on film funds, grants, or a broadcaster
How to build an audience for your film before it is released
How to get access to hospitals, care facilities, and other closed institutions
How to produce a documentary across multiple countries
Who Believed in You First?
Season 6
Thursday, July 30, 2026 • Duration 13:51
Who believed in you before you could believe in yourself?
In this Deep Dive, documentary filmmaker Christian Taylor makes a quiet case that we rarely overcome self-doubt on our own. Almost no one finishes anything hard alone. Someone has to see it in you first. This is a reflection on the power of belief, on the kind of encouragement that shows up right when you are ready to quit, and on how a few honest words can help a person keep going and change the whole outcome of a life.
This Deep Dive grows out of Documentary First Episode 283 with Joe Amodei, the veteran film distributor who, after forty-five years of releasing other people's films, finally directed his own: Cold War in Philly. The seed is a story Joe told about his friend Morgan Spurlock, who looked at him and said, "Yes, you are," when Joe insisted he was not a director. Morgan died before filming began. Joe made the film anyway.
From there, Christian follows the same pattern through her own life and through stories you already know: the producer Sandy Gordon, who told her she could tell her own story; C.S. Lewis's belief that helped J.R.R. Tolkien finish The Lord of the Rings; Emmy Werner's forty-year Kauai study on the power of one caring adult; Fred Shero and the 1976 Philadelphia Flyers; the BELIEVE sign in Ted Lasso; and the Christmas her young son Hunter talked her out of quitting The Girl Who Wore Freedom. The throughline: belief usually arrives from outside before it grows from within, it works by being repeated at the moment you want to give up, and it is something you can hand another person for the price of a sentence.
In this episode, Christian explores:
Why we so often cannot see in ourselves what other people can see plainly
The difference between belief that gets you to the starting line and belief that gets you to the finish
Why encouragement has to be repeated, not announced once
How Morgan Spurlock's belief outlived him and finished Joe Amodei's first film
What C.S. Lewis's encouragement had to do with Tolkien finishing The Lord of the Rings
Ep. 283 I 7 Filmmaking Tips From the Distributor Who Directed "Cold War in Philly"
Season 6 · Episode 283
Thursday, July 23, 2026 • Duration 54:11
What does it really take to make a documentary that finds an audience and earns its money back?
“You have to have the passion for the story and the passion to do the work, because it will not be easy.”
— Joe Amodei
If you want to make a documentary, the hardest questions are not the ones about cameras. They are about access, money, and whether anyone will ever watch it. In Documentary First Episode 283, a distributor who has spent more than forty-five years releasing films, and has now directed his first one, gives 7 filmmaking tips that cut straight to those questions, from getting access to a famous subject to setting a budget that can actually earn its money back.
The throughline is simple and a little daring: a career distributor became a first-time director, determined not to repeat the mistakes he had watched other filmmakers make. Along the way he explains how he got access to a legendary NHL team through its alumni association, why he kept the budget under $250,000, why a built-in audience mattered so much, and a first documentary that sold out theaters across Philadelphia. Running underneath it is the Cold War itself: the KGB minders, the players who hated the government but not each other, and the heroes Joe got on camera before they were gone.
Ep. 282 I Finding the Heartbeat of Your Story | A Lesson From Normandy
Season 6 · Episode 282
Thursday, July 16, 2026 • Duration 12:04
How do you make people care about your documentary?
Facts alone rarely make an audience care. The emotional core of a documentary lives somewhere else. In this episode of Documentary First, filmmaker Christian Taylor tells the story of how she found the heartbeat her film about the Battle of Carentan was missing. It was not in the archives. It was in the memories of a man who was six years old when the war came for his town.
For months, Christian’s film Heroes of Carentan felt stuck in what one WWII veteran called the “data of history,” the maps, the dates, and the military maneuvers. Everything shifted when she met Yves Marchais. In June 1944, Yves was a small boy living under German occupation in Carentan, France. This year he sent Christian thirteen letters recording what he remembered, and those letters gave the historical record a soul.
It comes down to a lesson every documentary filmmaker learns the hard way: audiences do not connect to issues or information, they connect to people. Anchored by a line from Pfc. John E. Fitzgerald, a runner for Medal of Honor recipient Lt. Col. Robert Cole, this episode argues that the essence of history is not its record but its heartbeat. Yves calls his own account his “hummingbird’s share,” not the whole war, but the small, vivid pieces that passed before a child’s eyes. His story becomes a lesson in telling a big historical event through one small, personal one.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
Why facts and figures alone rarely move an audience
How to find the emotional core, or heartbeat, of a documentary
Why audiences connect to people, not to issues or information
How to tell a big historical story through one small, personal one
What Pfc. John E. Fitzgerald meant when he warned that history can lose its heartbeat
Ep. 281 I 13 Letters That Saved a Dying WWII Documentary - on Heroes of Carentan Pt 1
Season 6 · Episode 281
Thursday, July 2, 2026 • Duration 11:29
Can thirteen letters from an 88-year-old stranger bring a dead film back to life?
For two years, Heroes of Carentan, Christian Taylor's documentary about the 101st Airborne Division and the June 1944 liberation of Carentan, sat on a shelf, half made. In this episode she tells the honest story of why a WWII documentary stalls, what it costs to keep going, and the thirteen letters from an 88-year-old man in France that finally gave the film its heartbeat back.
In Episode 281 of Documentary First, Christian Taylor takes listeners inside her upcoming film for the first time. Part 1 is how Heroes of Carentan fell apart, and how it came back. Part 2 travels to Normandy, where the letters came to life.
Christian walks through the three walls that stalled the film: a story that had all its pieces but none of the feeling, a modern-to-historical framing device that turned into a cage, and the reality of self-funding a documentary, including a Covid disaster loan she wished she'd never taken. Then comes the breakthrough, hidden in two years of research, and the moment she remembered Yves Marchais, who was six and a half years old when the 101st Airborne liberated his town.
In this episode, you'll learn:
Why a documentary can have every piece in place and still feel dead on the screen
How a timely framing device can quietly become a liability that dates a film
What self-funding a documentary can mean, and the loan no one talks about
Why the story of the Battle of Carentan was not working
How going back to the research, not the footage, broke a two-year block
Why pointing the camera at the people the soldiers saved changed everything
Who Yves Marchais is, and why his memories reframed the whole film
The Disappointment You Didn't Choose I Deep Dive on Ep. 280
Season 6
Thursday, June 25, 2026 • Duration 08:14
What if the disappointment you didn't choose was the only door to the life you were meant to live?
Three generations of one family chased professional baseball, and all three lost it to a career-ending injury. Each one found his calling in the aftermath. That pattern runs through Voices: The Danny Gans Story, filmmaker Andrew Gans's documentary about his father, the Las Vegas entertainer known as the Man of Many Voices. In this Deep Dive, Christian Taylor sits with what Andrew's film, and her own family's story, reveal about disappointment, the courage to tell the truth, and the doors we would never have chosen to walk through.
In this Deep Dive on Documentary First Episode 280 with Andrew Gans, Christian goes deeper into the heartbreak behind the film: a lost baseball career, a father's sudden death, a movie nearly ended by COVID, and the hard choice between protecting a hero and telling the truth. She connects it to her own son's last-minute disqualification that sent him to Normandy and seeded her film The Girl Who Wore Freedom, and to the warning Danny Gans's story carries for anyone living with chronic pain.
The thread tying it together is simple and hard. The worst thing that happens to you is almost never what you would have chosen, and sometimes it is the only door to the life you were meant to live. But not every closed door opens onto something better. Danny built an extraordinary life after his injury, then lost the end of that life to the medication treating his chronic pain. The doorway and the warning reach us through the same act: Andrew's refusal to quit.
In this episode, Christian explores:
Why three generations of one family lost their baseball dreams to injury and found their calling in the aftermath
How Andrew Gans set out to honor his father and ended up telling a harder, more honest story
Why the worst thing that happens to you can become the only door to the life you were meant to live
How COVID and lost funding became the reason the most personal part of the film exists
What to say to a music company when the budget you have is the only budget there is
Why a music documentary takes five years on average, and what eats the time
Why a rejection is usually about the marketplace rather than about your film
How to open a door with someone you admire without being, in her words, a scary, creepy fan
What it looks like inside a company that generates most of its projects out of its own catalog
CHAPTERS
0:00 What Concord Actually Bought With RKO
5:34 From CBGB's to Running a Studio Division
11:42 Reaching Out to People Above You
16:32 Why Distribution Is Scary for Everybody
21:26 Who Are You Really Competing With?
26:02 Music Rights for Film: Sync and Publishing
29:49 Why a Doc Takes Five Years
34:54 How Does She Decide What Gets Made?
41:44 Women, Allies, and Your Replacement
46:05 What if You Can't Afford the Song?
50:05 Closing Argument and DocuView Deja Vu
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
How do you get music rights for a documentary?
You need permission from more than one owner. The song belongs to a publisher and the specific recording belongs to a label, so most documentaries need both a sync license and a master use license. On Stax: Soulsville U.S.A., that meant clearing more than thirty artists, multiple publishers and several estates. Concord Originals EVP Sophia Dilley says the first step is acknowledging you need those rights before you build the film around them.
What if I can't afford to license a song for my film?
Call anyway, and be honest about the budget. Sophia Dilley advises independent filmmakers to say who they are, name what the film was made for, show the actual scene the song would sit under, and ask directly for help. "Behind every door at every music company, there are real people," she says. A studio with a real budget cannot use that approach. A genuine independent often can.
How long does it take to make a music documentary?
Longer than most filmmakers expect. Sophia Dilley of Concord Originals puts the average at five years, at least. Stax: Soulsville U.S.A. began in 2018, when a colleague walked into her office with the story, and premiered on HBO in May 2024. Much of that time goes to music rights, estates and publishers rather than to production, because every stakeholder connected to the music has to be brought on side first.
Who owns RKO now?
Concord Originals acquired RKO Pictures in June 2025, but the deal is narrower than it sounds. Distribution rights to the classic RKO library remain with Turner. What Concord bought are the derivative rights, meaning remakes, sequels, prequels, story and stage rights to more than 5,000 titles the studio produced in-house. Sophia Dilley serves as Co-President of RKO, which continues to operate under Concord Originals.
DOCUVIEW DEJA VU PICKS
Sophia Dilley's picks:
New York Doll (2005), directed by Greg Whiteley. A deep cut about Arthur "Killer" Kane of the New York Dolls and his search for his own history. Dilley notes that Whiteley went on to make Cheer, and the warmth is already here.
Science Fair (2018), directed by Cristina Costantini and Darren Foster. She saw it at SXSW, where it won the Audience Award. Teenagers at the international science fair, and, in her words, so much magic in following a real human story.
SPONSORED BY
This episode is brought to you by Virgil Films Entertainment. Over 25 years of distribution experience, from Super Size Me and the Oscar-nominated Restrepo to Forks Over Knives and Speed is Expensive. If you are a filmmaker having trouble with distribution, talk to Virgil.
LISTEN AND FOLLOW
Listen on any podcast app: https://pod.fo/e/5ffe38
Watch on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@documentaryfirst
Support the show on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/DocumentaryFirst
CONNECT
Documentary First on all platforms: https://linktr.ee/doc1st
Christian Taylor on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/meetchristiantaylor
ABOUT THE GUEST
Sophia Dilley is Executive Vice President of Concord Originals and Co-President of RKO. Concord hired her in 2018 to build a content strategy, and in 2021 she launched Concord Originals, the company's film and television division. Her father was a production designer, so she grew up on movie sets watching what the work actually costs. Before film, she thought she would go into music: piano, violin, voice lessons, and a punk band in high school that played CBGB's in New York.
ABOUT CONCORD ORIGINALS
Concord Originals is the film and television arm of Concord, developing screen stories out of one of the largest independent music and theatrical catalogs in the world. Most of its projects are self-generated, which Dilley describes as the division's whole remit: take what is already under the roof and find a new life for it. Because the catalog is the source, music rights for film sit at the center of nearly every project the division takes on.
Recent and upcoming work discussed in this episode:
Stax: Soulsville U.S.A. (HBO, 2024), the four-part series directed by Jamila Wignot. Peabody winner, nominated for two Emmys.
Films on Billie Holiday, Cyndi Lauper, Shari Lewis and Lamb Chop, and Creedence Clearwater Revival, with Robert Johnson and Fania Records on the way.
ABOUT DOCUMENTARY FIRST
Documentary First is a weekly podcast about the people behind documentaries and what making them taught them. Host Christian Taylor, director of the award-winning The Girl Who Wore Freedom, talks with filmmakers from Ken Burns to first-time directors. Listen Notes ranks the show in the top 5% of all podcasts worldwide.
RESOURCES MENTIONED
Soulsville U.S.A.: The Story of Stax Records by Rob Bowman, the book behind the film: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2775862
Documentary First Episode 277, Teddy Cannon on music rights and licensing, the other side of this conversation: https://pod.fo/e/413f3a
Why Andre deliberately hired a crew who knew nothing about Gwynn Park, the region, or basketball
The cold call that landed Hall of Fame coach Tubby Smith
How a three-hour conversation in a Brooklyn coffee shop with writer-director Marquis Smalls became his production blueprint
What two heart attacks in three days taught him about succession, and what he changed the week he got out
How AI reenacted a co-protagonist who had died and left almost no footage behind
Why announcing the film on Instagram is the thing that made him finish it
What NIL deals, unrestricted transfers, and year-round travel ball are doing to community public schools
THE FIVE LESSONS
Lean into your superpowers
Get comfortable taking calculated risks
Get creative about filling gaps
Plan for your absence
Use AI as a second brain
CHAPTERS
0:00 No Film School, No Connections
3:16 How Do You Fund a First Documentary?
6:09 When a Team Becomes a Town
11:53 The Cost of Commercializing Youth Sports
18:58 Planning for Your Own Absence
24:37 AI as a Second Brain
29:16 Cold Calling a Hall of Fame Coach
33:45 Why the Collective Should Matter
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
How do you make a documentary with no film school?
Lean into the skills you already have and hire for the ones you do not. Andre N. Jackson spent twenty years as an intelligence analyst, so he built his film on research and relationship building, the two things he was already good at. Then he deliberately recruited crew members who covered his gaps in craft and experience. He learned filmmaking by making a film, not before making one.
How do you fund a documentary with no industry money?
A fiscal sponsor is the most common route. It is a 501(c)(3) that sits between your project and your donors, so contributions become tax deductible and donors have a reason to say yes. Andre used the Southern Documentary Fund. You apply, you are accepted, you onboard, and then you can offer donors a tax break for backing your film. He combined that with personal funds and direct fundraising.
How do you get well-known people to be in your documentary?
Cold call them, and be specific about who you both know. Andre landed Hall of Fame coach Tubby Smith by reaching out directly and naming a mutual connection to establish trust. He got Wake Forest star Randolph Childress through a warm introduction from a Gwynn Park alumnus. The pattern is the same either way: ask, and use the relationships your relationships already have.
What happens to your documentary if you cannot finish it?
Plan for your absence before you need to. After two heart attacks during production, Andre started documenting what had only ever lived in his head and briefed his executive producer and his producer on the next steps, so the film could be completed whether or not he was there. Contingency planning in film usually means backup drives. It should also mean succession.
Can AI help you make your first documentary?
Andre used it three ways: to learn the end-to-end production process he never went to film school for, to generate an animated reenactment of a co-protagonist who had died and left almost no footage behind, and as a second brain that challenged his assumptions and pressure-tested his interview questions. He was clear it supplemented human mentorship rather than replacing it, and credits Brooklyn writer-director Marquis Smalls, who drew him a blueprint over three hours.
DOCUVIEW DÉJÀ VU PICKS
"Undefeated" (2011), directed by Daniel Lindsay and T.J. Martin. Winner of the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature. Andre's direct inspiration for making "Beyond Banners."
"The Last Dance" (2020), ESPN and Netflix. Andre is a Michael Jordan fan and names it as the film that came before Undefeated for him.
SPONSORED BY
This episode is brought to you by Virgil Films Entertainment. With over 25 years of distribution experience, Virgil has released Super Size Me, the Oscar-nominated Restrepo, Forks Over Knives, To Die For, Seven Yards, and Speed is Expensive. If you are a filmmaker having trouble with distribution, talk to Virgil. https://virgilfilms.com
ABOUT THE GUEST
Andre N. Jackson is a first-time documentary filmmaker based in Fairfax, Virginia. He wrote and directed "Beyond Banners." He spent twenty years in the private sector in technology and security, including work at Capital One and Amazon and a brief stint at the Department of Homeland Security, and he worked as an intelligence analyst on cybersecurity and terrorism issues related to national security. He is a 1998 graduate of Gwynn Park High School, the subject of his film. He came to filmmaking with no film school and no industry connections.
ABOUT THE FILM
"Beyond Banners" is directed by Andre N. Jackson and follows the basketball program at Gwynn Park High School in Prince George's County, Maryland. In the words of the film's own logline: a son returns to his alma mater to carry his father's coaching legacy, only to discover that the winning tradition he grew up in was built for a world that no longer exists.
The film follows an intertwined father-and-son story, Howard Matthews and Steve Matthews, and widens into a portrait of what community-based youth sports used to be and what the commercialization of high school athletics is doing to it. Produced and edited by Daniel Bowie, with animation and motion design by Henry Gretzinger. Historian Ida E. Jones of Morgan State University asks the question Andre names as his favorite line in the film: "What is it about community that makes us community?" It also features Hall of Fame coach Tubby Smith, Wake Forest star Randolph Childress, who broke ACC records, sportswriter Neil Greenberger, who spent twenty years at The Washington Post and led its local sports section, and archival footage The film is headed to the festival circuit.
Documentary First is a weekly podcast about the people behind documentaries and what making them taught them. Host Christian Taylor, director of the award-winning The Girl Who Wore Freedom, talks with filmmakers from Ken Burns to...
2:04 The Most Dangerous Feeling
5:16 The People and the Plan
7:53 Build Belonging Before Buzz
11:26 Meet Them, Don’t Aim
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
How do you build an audience for a documentary before it is released? You build belonging first. Jonathan de Jong built a movement around “Human Forever” before the film existed, a real person at the center and bestselling books out in the world, so audiences already felt part of something by release. The lesson for any filmmaker: make people feel they belong to what you are doing long before you ask them to watch, buy, or share it.
What is the best way to market a documentary with no budget? Stop marketing and start including. Invite people into the mission instead of aiming promotion at them. When an audience feels seen and part of the story, they carry it for you. Belonging spreads a film further than any ad spend, which is why Jonathan filled theaters for a film about dementia without a marketing war chest.
What is Martin Buber’s “I and Thou” about? “I and Thou,” published in 1923, describes two ways of relating to another person. You can treat someone as an “It,” a thing to manage, a number, a problem to handle. Or you can meet them as a “Thou,” a whole person, encountered directly. Buber argued that real life is found in the “Thou,” in genuine meeting rather than use.
Why do people stop watching independent films and podcasts? Because they can feel when a creator is aiming something at them instead of making something for them. The moment an audience becomes a view count or a click to convert, the work loses the sense that it was made for real people. People stay when they feel met and included, and they drift when they feel handled.
ABOUT THE FILMS AND TOPIC
“Human Forever” is a documentary directed by Dutch filmmaker Jonathan de Jong through SUPER7EVEN Productions. It follows the young dementia-care nurse Teun Toebes as he lives among and travels the world alongside people with dementia, and it became the most-watched human interest documentary in Dutch cinema history. The film is one piece of a larger movement that also includes Teun’s bestselling books and the Article 25 Foundation he co-founded.
Jonathan de Jong is a Dutch filmmaker and author who builds socially focused stories, and the guest on Documentary First Episode 284. SUPER7EVEN Productions: https://supersevenproductions.com. Film: https://human-forever.com.
Teun Toebes is a nurse, humanitarian activist, and bestselling author who has spent years living inside dementia wards around the world. https://www.teuntoebes.com.
ABOUT DOCUMENTARY FIRST: THE DEEP DIVE
Each week, host Christian Taylor takes an insight from a recent Documentary First filmmaker interview and follows it through literature, philosophy, faith, and her own life. Christian is an award-winning documentary filmmaker, actor, and voice actor, and the director of “The Girl Who Wore Freedom.” The Deep Dive is built for documentary filmmakers, lovers of story, and anyone who wants to think more deeply about the work of making things.
RESOURCES MENTIONED
“Human Forever” (film), Jonathan de Jong, SUPER7EVEN Productions: https://human-forever.com
Documentary First Episode 284 with Jonathan de Jong: https://pod.fo/e/50bde1
LISTEN AND FOLLOW
Listen and subscribe wherever you get podcasts: https://podfollow.com/documentary-first Watch on YouTube: @DocumentaryFirst
SUPPORT THE SHOW
Join our community on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/documentaryfirst
CONNECT WITH DOCUMENTARY FIRST
All platforms: https://linktr.ee/doc1st Christian Taylor on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/meetchristiantaylor
Why Jonathan approaches every film as a product, not only a passion project
How partnering with mission-aligned organizations can both fund and distribute your film
The “be Switzerland” method for directing a subject to get honest, real reactions
How to keep a film earning and touring years after its release
Why treating a serious subject with warmth beats treating it as only serious
What the record-breaking success of Human Forever teaches about impact over views
CHAPTERS
0:00 Breaking In Without Film School
5:06 Finding a Story Worth Telling
7:24 Build the Audience Before Release
12:21 When the Funding Fell Through
15:18 You Can't Buy Happiness
20:33 What Moldova Taught Him
26:47 Making the Camera Invisible
30:30 Directing a Neutral Protagonist
37:17 How Do You Get Access?
42:28 Where Does the Money Come From?
47:38 He Made Dementia Sexy
Frequently Asked Questions
How do you fund a documentary without grants or film funds?
Partner with mission-aligned organizations. Jonathan de Jong funds his films by teaming with social organizations, foundations, and local and national governments that care about the subject. Each contributes a smaller amount, and together they add up to a full budget. Because those partners also have large audiences, they become the film's first ambassadors, so the same partnership that funds the film also helps get it seen.
How do you get access to film inside hospitals or care facilities?
Invest time and build trust before the camera rolls. Jonathan spent years present without filming, and left the camera in the room so people grew used to it. Family members had to sign consent, and because his protagonist Teun Toebes was a trusted figure in dementia care, facilities welcomed the crew. Access came from relationships and patience, not from official fixers.
How do you build an audience for a documentary before it comes out?
Start years early and grow the audience alongside the film. Jonathan built a following through a bestselling book, a touring theater show, and social media, and he turned his protagonist into a recognized voice in the field. By the time Human Forever premiered, the audience and a network of ambassadors already existed, so the film became, in his words, the cherry on top.
How do you produce a documentary in multiple countries?
Work through the local community, not official fixers. Jonathan connects with people already working in the subject area, who bring in local governments and organizations to arrange permits and logistics. He keeps a small, lean crew that can move fast, and he builds a network of ambassadors in each country. That is how he filmed across eleven countries during a pandemic.
DocuView Déjà Vu
Jonathan's documentary pick is Searching for Sugar Man, which he calls one of the best documentaries ever made and a reminder of what the power of storytelling can do.
Sponsored by Virgil Films Entertainment
This episode is brought to you by Virgil Films Entertainment. With over 25 years of distribution experience, Virgil Films helps filmmakers get their work in front of audiences on every major platform. Learn more at https://www.virgilfilms.com/.
About the Guest
Jonathan de Jong is a Dutch documentary filmmaker and the founder of SUPER7EVEN Productions. He directs socially driven films that reach big audiences, and he is best known for Human Forever, the most-watched human interest documentary in Dutch cinema history. Website: https://supersevenproductions.com
SUPER7EVEN Productions is Jonathan de Jong's Netherlands-based company, making impact-driven documentaries on pressing social issues. Human Forever premiered around a 2023 G20 summit and is now used in more than 40 universities, including Yale and Oxford, with a US broadcast coming to PBS. Jonathan's next films explore strong communities and addiction.
About Human Forever and Teun Toebes
Human Forever follows Teun Toebes, a young care ethicist dubbed the “Greta Thunberg of healthcare,” who moved into the closed ward of a nursing home at 21 and traveled across four continents and eleven countries to ask how we can give people living with dementia a better quality of life. Teun's book, The Housemates, was a number one bestseller in Denmark and has been translated into English, German, Italian, and Arabic. Website: https://www.teuntoebes.com.
About Documentary First
Documentary First is a weekly podcast about the craft, business, and truth of documentary filmmaking, hosted by filmmaker Christian Taylor. Across nearly 300 episodes, the guest chair has held everyone from Ken Burns to first-time independents. Documentary First ranks in the top 5 percent of all podcasts worldwide on Listen Notes, is the number one documentary film podcast in the US on MillionPodcasts, and holds a 4.8 out of 5 on Apple Podcasts. Christian Taylor is a documentary filmmaker, actor, and voice actor, and the director of The Girl Who Wore Freedom.
Resources Mentioned
Human Forever (film): https://www.teuntoebes.com/human-forever
The single factor that most helped at-risk children thrive in the forty-year Kauai study
What the 1976 Flyers and the BELIEVE sign in Ted Lasso have in common
The Christmas her son Hunter believed in her when she was ready to walk away from her film
The strange math of belief: nearly free to give, and one of the most powerful things we do
Two things to do this week: remember who believed in you, and become that person for someone else
CHAPTERS
0:00 Before You Believe in Yourself
2:49 Someone Has to See It First
5:37 Encouragement When You Want to Quit
8:34 Belief That Outlives Us
11:14 How to Believe in Others
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Why is it important to have someone believe in you?
Because most of us cannot see our own potential clearly. We are too close to our own doubts. Belief from a credible person on the outside fills that gap and raises both effort and persistence, especially at the moment someone is ready to quit. Research on self-efficacy and on childhood resilience points the same way: one steady person who believes in you can change what you attempt and what you actually finish.
How do you keep going when you want to quit a creative project?
You borrow belief until you can make your own. Nearly everyone who finishes a hard project hits a wall where they are sure it is over. What carries people through is usually not one pep talk but someone who reminds them, again and again, that they can do it. Christian Taylor finished her documentary after her young son repeated his belief in her until she could go back to work.
How do you believe in yourself when no one else does?
You usually do not have to do it entirely alone. The honest move this episode offers is to remember that someone has already believed in you, even if you have forgotten them, and to borrow that belief until it becomes your own. Recall what they saw in you. And if you feel truly without support right now, become the encourager you needed: the same words that steady other people can steady you when you say them to yourself.
Can one person really change your life?
Yes. In Emmy Werner's forty-year Kauai study of nearly 700 children, about a third of the high-risk kids grew into capable, caring adults, and the strongest protective factor was having at least one steady adult who believed in them. One was enough. The same pattern shows up in creative work, where a single believer often decides whether a project is abandoned or finished.
What does it mean that belief can outlive the believer?
It means the encouragement someone gives you keeps working even after they are gone. Morgan Spurlock told Joe Amodei he could direct, then died before filming started, and Joe finished the film anyway. Fred Shero's line to the Flyers, "Win today and we'll walk together forever," names the same truth: the people who believe in us walk with us long after the moment itself has passed.
ABOUT THE FILMS AND WORKS IN THIS EPISODE
Cold War in Philly, directed by Joe Amodei (Virgil Films): the story of the night in 1976 the Philadelphia Flyers beat the Soviet Red Army. https://coldwarinphilly.com
The Girl Who Wore Freedom, directed by Christian Taylor: the documentary referenced throughout this episode.
Also referenced: La La Land (2016, written and directed by Damien Chazelle); Man of La Mancha; Ted Lasso (Apple TV+); The Lord of the Rings and the friendship of J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis; Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom; and "Wind Beneath My Wings," popularized by Bette Midler.
ABOUT DOCUMENTARY FIRST: THE DEEP DIVE
Documentary First: The Deep Dive is the companion to Documentary First, where host Christian Taylor takes one insight from a recent conversation and follows it wherever it leads. Christian is a documentary filmmaker, actor, and voice actor, and the director of The Girl Who Wore Freedom and Heroes of Carentan.
RESOURCES MENTIONED
Documentary First Episode 283 with Joe Amodei: [add episode URL]
Cold War in Philly: https://coldwarinphilly.com
Virgil Films: https://virgilfilms.com
Emmy Werner, the Kauai Longitudinal Study
The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien
Tuesdays with Morrie, by Mitch Albom
La La Land (2016)
Man of La Mancha
Ted Lasso (Apple TV+)
LISTEN AND FOLLOW
Listen on any podcast app: https://podfollow.com/documentary-first
Support the show on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/c/DocumentaryFirst
CONNECT
Documentary First Linktree: https://linktr.ee/doc1st
Christian Taylor on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/meetchristiantaylor
IN THIS EPISODE, YOU'LL LEARN:
How to get access to famous people and organizations, through the alumni association
What Joe did once he was in the room: prove yourself, be yourself, and be honest
The deals he had to clear before filming, the team, the owner, and the league, and that they took nearly a year
Why a built-in audience is what decides whether an indie film succeeds
What to budget for a documentary, and why Joe will not spend more than $250,000 on an indie doc
How Joe made sure to get the players on camera, including two who passed away after their interviews
Why his first film took two and a half years, and what he would do differently next time
The qualities that make a film distributor worth trusting: answering calls, paying on time, being honest
The two things Joe says it takes to finish a film
Why Joe believes the work is worth it, from the players' gratitude to a film that outlives everyone
CHAPTERS
0:00 Becoming a First-Time Director
2:42 How Do You Get Access?
9:33 Capturing Heroes in Time
13:04 Structuring the Documentary
21:20 The Grind of Production
28:11 Selling Out Theaters
38:32 What Makes a Film Succeed?
41:37 What Should a Doc Budget Be?
44:48 How Do You Keep Going?
47:38 Is Filmmaking Worth It?
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
How do you get access to famous people or organizations for a documentary?
Go through the alumni association. Joe Amodei got the Philadelphia Flyers by working with the team's alumni group, which controls appearances for former players. Nearly every major sports team and league has one, usually run by one or two people. Find that person, earn their trust, and they can open the door to the whole roster. Then be ready to handle the separate contracts with the team, the owner, and the league.
How much does it cost to make a documentary?
For an independent documentary, Joe Amodei's rule is not to spend more than $250,000. The reasoning is about return: know what the film can realistically earn back before you set the documentary budget, and understand the market you are spending against. A built-in audience and disciplined spending give a documentary a real chance to make its money back.
What makes an independent film succeed in today's market?
A built-in audience. Joe Amodei says a film does best when people already care about the subject before it exists. Cold War in Philly had Flyers fans waiting for it, and the sold-out theatrical run followed. If you cannot name the audience for your idea, Joe's view is you might not want to make it. When you can, the film has a base to launch from and can cross over to viewers beyond the core, people who told Joe they were not even hockey fans.
What does it take to succeed as a documentary filmmaker?
Two things, according to Joe Amodei: passion and willpower. Passion for the story carries you through a process that will not be easy, and willpower keeps you going when the edit stalls and the work is not moving as fast as you wanted. You owe it to your investors, your subjects, and the people who gave up their time to sit for you. His advice is simple: you cannot give up.
What should you look for in a film distributor?
Christian describes what makes Joe a distributor worth trusting: he answers calls and emails, pays on time, sends the reports that are due, and is honest. She notes that this basic reliability is rarer than it should be in the business, and it is exactly what separates a distributor you can trust from one you cannot.
DOCUVIEW DÉJÀ VU PICKS
In the DocuView Déjà Vu segment, Joe Amodei highlighted two documentaries from the Virgil Films slate: She Was Here, about the young actress from Poltergeist, and Broken Brothers, directed by Jeff Levine, a future Documentary First guest. Both are available on Amazon and Apple TV.
SPONSORED BY
Virgil Films Entertainment. With more than twenty-five years of distribution experience, Virgil releases documentaries and indie features and works directly with every major platform. Learn more at https://virgilfilms.com.
ABOUT JOE AMODEI
Joe Amodei is the founder of Virgil Films and a film distributor with more than forty-five years in the industry. He started in retail, worked in live entertainment for Ted Turner and Barry Diller, and went on to release hundreds of documentaries, including Super Size Me, the Oscar-nominated Restrepo, and Forks Over Knives. Cold War in Philly is his directorial debut, the story of the 1976 game in which the Philadelphia Flyers beat the Soviet Red Army. Learn more at https://coldwarinphilly.com.
ABOUT VIRGIL FILMS
Virgil Films and Entertainment is an independent distributor known for documentaries and indie features, with a catalog that includes Super Size Me, Restrepo, Forks Over Knives, To Die For, Seven Yards, and Speed is Expensive. The company works directly with every major transactional platform and offers filmmakers a range of deals, from standard distribution to service arrangements. Recent and upcoming releases include She Was Here and Broken Brothers. Learn more at https://virgilfilms.com.
ABOUT DOCUMENTARY FIRST
Documentary First is the show where we dig into the craft of filmmaking, the business, and the truth of it. Host Christian Taylor is a documentary filmmaker, actor, and voice actor, and the director of The Girl Who Wore Freedom and Heroes of Carentan. Each week she sits down with the people who make documentaries and pulls out what actually works.
Why one person’s story can carry an entire historical event
What the “hummingbird’s share” is, and why small memories matter more than big ones
How the Battle of Carentan looked through the eyes of a six-year-old boy
How Yves Marchais and his family survived the occupation and liberation of Carentan
Why the story a filmmaker starts with is often not the story worth telling
What the series Band of Brothers has to do with the real Battle of Carentan
How to know when your film has finally found its emotional core
Chapters:
00:00 Meeting a survivor of Carentan
01:15 13 letters and Band of Brothers
02:26 Life under German occupation
04:01 D-Day and the kitchen sink
05:27 Fleeing an empty Carentan
06:59 The trench and liberation
08:45 Colonel Cole and the runner
10:57 The lesson: find your heartbeat
Frequently Asked Questions:
How do you find the emotional core of a documentary?
Facts and chronology rarely move an audience on their own. The emotional core, what host Christian Taylor calls the heartbeat, usually lives in one person’s specific, lived experience rather than in the broad historical record. In this episode she describes finding it in the memories of Yves Marchais, a French civilian who was six during the Battle of Carentan, and building the film’s meaning around his point of view.
How do you make an audience care about a documentary subject?
Audiences connect to people far more than to issues or information. The most reliable way to make viewers care about a large subject, a war, a movement, a crisis, is to tell it through one specific person whose experience makes the bigger story personal. In this episode, Christian Taylor builds her film about the Battle of Carentan around a single child’s memories rather than the broad military record.
What was the Battle of Carentan?
The Battle of Carentan was a June 1944 fight for the town of Carentan in Normandy, France, a key objective linking the American forces landing at Utah and Omaha beaches. The 101st Airborne Division, including units later made famous by Band of Brothers, fought to take the town, which was liberated on June 12, 1944.
Who is Yves Marchais?
Yves Marchais is a French man who, as a six-year-old boy, lived through the German occupation and the 1944 liberation of Carentan. Decades later he recorded his childhood memories of the war in a series of letters, which became the emotional core of Christian Taylor’s documentary. He calls his account his “hummingbird’s share,” the small, true pieces of history he witnessed firsthand.
What did Pfc. John Fitzgerald mean about history losing its heartbeat?
Pfc. John E. Fitzgerald, who served as a runner for Medal of Honor recipient Lt. Col. Robert Cole, wrote that the data of history should not lose its heartbeat as it becomes information, or all that remains is the record without the essence. Christian Taylor uses that idea as the key to her film: the facts of a battle matter, but the human story is what makes people care.
About the Film and the Story:
Heroes of Carentan is Christian Taylor’s in-production documentary about the 1944 liberation of Carentan, Normandy, told through the people who lived it. Yves Marchais was six years old during the battle. His firsthand account of the occupation, the bombing, his family’s escape through a deserted town, and the moment of liberation forms the emotional center of the film. This episode is the second part of Christian’s story about finding that center.
About Documentary First:
Documentary First is a weekly podcast about the craft, business, and truth of documentary filmmaking. Host Christian Taylor is a documentary filmmaker (The Girl Who Wore Freedom), actor, voice actor, and podcast host based in the United States. Each week she explores what it takes to tell true stories that move people, through interviews with filmmakers and solo episodes drawn from her own work.
Resources Mentioned:
The Colonel and the Runner, by Pfc. John E. Fitzgerald (a recollection of Lt. Col. Robert G. Cole, 502nd Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division)
Band of Brothers (Episode 3 follows the Battle of Carentan)
The Girl Who Wore Freedom, Christian Taylor’s award-winning D-Day documentary
Documentary First on all platforms: https://linktr.ee/doc1st
Connect with Christian Taylor on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/meetchristiantaylor
How thirteen letters from an 88-year-old man gave the film its heartbeat
What separates Heroes of Carentan from The Girl Who Wore Freedom
Why the cost of war, carried in one person, became the true subject
CHAPTERS
0:00 A letter from Carentan
0:32 Why this episode is for you
1:19 Heroes of Carentan and The Girl Who Wore Freedom
1:50 Normandy's gratitude, and where this show began
2:46 Two years on the shelf: the three walls
2:57 Wall 1: all the pieces, none of the feeling
3:41 Wall 2: the framing that became a cage
4:34 Wall 3: self-funding, burnout, and the loan no one talks about
5:48 The breakthrough hiding in the research
6:32 Point the camera at the ones they saved
7:08 Meeting Yves Marchais
8:27 Thirteen letters from a child of war
10:25 The heartbeat, and off to Normandy
Frequently Asked Questions
What was the Battle of Carentan in June 1944?
The Battle of Carentan was fought from June 10 to 14, 1944, days after the D-Day landings. The U.S. 101st Airborne Division fought to take the Norman town of Carentan, which linked the Utah and Omaha beachheads. After crossing an exposed causeway under fire, the Americans forced the German defenders out on June 12, then held the town against a counterattack with help from the 2nd Armored Division.
Who liberated Carentan in World War II?
Carentan was liberated by the U.S. 101st Airborne Division, the Screaming Eagles, in June 1944. The 501st, 502nd, and 506th Parachute Infantry Regiments and the 327th Glider Infantry Regiment spearheaded the fight, with Lieutenant Colonel Robert Cole leading a famous charge along the road nicknamed Purple Heart Lane. In addition, tanks from the 2nd Armored Division helped repel the German counterattack on June 13.
What is the documentary Heroes of Carentan about?
Heroes of Carentan is a feature documentary by filmmaker Christian Taylor about the liberation of Carentan, France, in June 1944, told through the people who lived it. After a two-year production stall, the film was rebuilt with the help of Yves Marchais, who was a six-year-old child during the battle and later wrote thirteen letters recounting his memories. It is Taylor's second feature, following The Girl Who Wore Freedom.
Why do documentary filmmakers self-fund their films?
Documentary funding is famously hard, and self-funding is common because otherwise many projects would never get made. Filmmakers often cover early costs themselves to show commitment before grants or investors come in. The current climate is tougher than usual, with the closure of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and cuts to PBS shrinking traditional support, so many filmmakers now rely on personal savings, credit, and small donor communities.
Who is Yves Marchais?
Yves Marchais is a French civilian who was six and a half years old when the U.S. 101st Airborne Division liberated his town of Carentan in June 1944. Now 88, he wrote thirteen letters to filmmaker Christian Taylor recounting his childhood memories of the occupation, the bombing, and the American soldiers who saved his family. His testimony became the emotional center of the documentary Heroes of Carentan.
About Heroes of Carentan
Heroes of Carentan is Christian Taylor's second feature documentary, currently in production. It tells the story of the liberation of Carentan, France, in June 1944 by the 101st Airborne Division, seen through the eyes of French civilian Yves Marchais, who lived through it as a six-year-old child.
About The Girl Who Wore Freedom
Christian Taylor's award-winning first documentary, about the gratitude the people of Normandy still carry for the American soldiers who liberated them. This episode includes a short clip from the film featuring Valerie Cardin and Marie-Pascal Legrand. Website: https://www.thegirlwhoworefreedom.com
About Documentary First
Documentary First is a weekly podcast about the craft, business, and truth of documentary filmmaking. Host Christian Taylor is a documentary filmmaker, actor, and voice artist with more than four decades in entertainment. Each week she sits down with documentary filmmakers and nonfiction storytellers, and The Deep Dive companion series explores a single idea from a recent conversation.
Resources Mentioned
The Girl Who Wore Freedom: https://www.thegirlwhoworefreedom.com
Listen & Follow
Listen and follow Documentary First: https://podfollow.com/documentary-first
Documentary First on all platforms: https://linktr.ee/doc1st
Christian Taylor on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/meetchristiantaylor
The choice every documentary filmmaker faces: protect the hero or tell the truth
Why someone is more of a hero when you see that they are human and flawed
How a soldier's unfair disqualification became the foundation for The Girl Who Wore Freedom
Why not every closed door opens onto something better, and how to hold that honestly
What Danny Gans's life and loss reveal about chronic pain and pain medication
Why holding your plan loosely can make a better film, and a better life
Chapters:
0:00 A Warning That Might Save Your Life
1:09 Andrew Gans: Losing the Dream and a Father
2:08 Three Generations, Three Closed Doors
2:54 How COVID Setbacks Shaped the Film
3:13 Making a Documentary About Your Own Family
3:33 Telling the Truth in a Documentary About Family
4:28 My Son Hunter and the Door to Normandy
5:42 Danny Gans: An Extraordinary Life and Tragic Loss
6:21 Chronic Pain and the Danger of Pain Medication
6:40 Why Persistence Matters in Filmmaking
7:02 Letting Go of Control
7:49 When Disappointment Is a Doorway
Frequently Asked Questions:
What is Voices: The Danny Gans Story about?
Voices: The Danny Gans Story is a documentary by Andrew Gans about his father, the Las Vegas entertainer Danny Gans, known as the Man of Many Voices. What started as a tribute became a more honest portrait, including the chronic pain Danny carried privately and the loss that ended his life. It is a son's effort to tell the whole truth about the man he admired.
Who was Danny Gans?
Danny Gans was a singer, comedian, and impressionist who became one of the biggest headliners in Las Vegas and was named Entertainer of the Year twelve times. Before entertainment, he was drafted by the White Sox organization, until a severed Achilles ended his baseball career and sent him toward the stage, where he became known as the Man of Many Voices.
How did Danny Gans die?
Danny Gans died in 2009 at age 52. His death was accidental, connected to prescription medication he was taking for chronic pain. Voices: The Danny Gans Story explores this honestly, presenting his story as both a tribute and a cautionary reminder about the risks of pain treatment for the millions of people who live with chronic pain every day.
How do you make a documentary about your own family?
Filmmakers documenting their own family often face a tension between honoring someone and telling the truth about them. In Voices: The Danny Gans Story, Andrew Gans chose to include painful discoveries about his father and to put himself in the film. The honest version, he found, made his father more of a hero, not less, because audiences connect with people who are human and flawed.
About the Film and the People:
Voices: The Danny Gans Story. Written and directed by Andrew Davies Gans, the documentary tells the story of his father, Danny Gans, the Las Vegas entertainer known as the Man of Many Voices. What began as a tribute became an honest portrait of a beloved performer, including the chronic pain he carried privately and the loss that ended his life.
Danny Gans. A singer, comedian, and impressionist who became one of Las Vegas's biggest headliners, named Entertainer of the Year twelve times. Before entertainment, he was drafted by the White Sox organization, until a severed Achilles ended his baseball career.
The Girl Who Wore Freedom. Christian Taylor's documentary about Normandy and the people liberated on D-Day, the film her son's unexpected assignment helped set in motion.
About Documentary First: The Deep Dive:
Each week, host Christian Taylor takes an insight from a recent Documentary First interview and explores it through story, philosophy, culture, and the universal human experience. It is a companion show to Documentary First, built for documentary filmmakers, lovers of story, and anyone who wants to think more deeply about what we watch. Christian Taylor is a documentary filmmaker (The Girl Who Wore Freedom), actor, voice actor, and podcast host based in the United States.
Resources Mentioned:
Documentary First Episode 280 with Andrew Gans: https://pod.fo/e/433e78
Voices: The Danny Gans Story, documentary directed by Andrew Davies Gans
The Girl Who Wore Freedom, documentary directed by Christian Taylor
Christian Taylor on IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm3041250/
Listen and Follow:
Documentary First everywhere you listen: https://podfollow.com/documentary-first
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