EXCLUSIVE: Emmy-winning filmmaker Erika Dilday is joining Ken Burns, Sarah Burns, and David McMahon as co-director and co-producer of the upcoming documentary film Emancipation to Exodus (working title). It’s a long-term commitment – the film about a critical period in the African American experience isn’t expected to air on PBS until 2027.
Dilday’s participation in the project will be as an independent filmmaker – in other words, separate from her role as executive director of American Documentary and executive producer of AmDoc’s PBS series POV and WORLD Channel’s America ReFramed.
Emancipation to Exodus (wt) explores the African American struggle for freedom and opportunity “from the Civil War and end of slavery, through Reconstruction and the start of the Great Migration out of the south that began in the early 20th century,” according to a release about the film.
Erika Dilday at the IDA Documentary Awards on December 10, 2022 in Los Angeles.
Charley Gallay/Getty Images for International Documentary Association
“My career as a filmmaker has been focused on making authentic and diverse narratives part of the current media landscape, to create an honest and accurate reflection of our country and the world we want to make,” Dilday said in a statement. “As a storyteller, I was drawn to my role at American Documentary precisely because of our mission to amplify underheard voices and confront difficult histories in the public media landscape. And I believe that it is our collective responsibility to make sure that public media truly is a space for all, by providing diverse, interesting, and accessible content to a public that needs and demands it.”
Dilday added, “Ken and his production teams have produced some of public television’s most memorable documentaries. As the documentary community looks to new models of collaboration, I’m excited to use my directing and producing talents on Emancipation to Exodus to tackle what is one of the most central and yet misunderstood stories in our country’s history.”
Production is currently underway on the film. In a statement, Ken Burns praised his collaborator, whose credits include executive producing After Sherman (2022), and The Neutral Ground (2021), and producing Albert Maysles’ In Transit (2015).
“Erika is an extraordinary journalist, filmmaker and media leader who will bring years of experience to a challenging story that spans decades of our history and continues to impact American life today,” Burns said. “I’ve wanted to explore Reconstruction and the nadir that followed its collapse since we completed The Civil War in 1990. Sarah, Dave and I are thrilled to be working with Erika on this project.”
Emancipation to Exodus (wt) is executive produced by Burns, whose company Florentine Films is producing the film with WETA Washington, D.C., “the leading public broadcaster in the nation’s capital.” Ken Burns, Sarah Burns and David McMahon also co-directed The Central Park Five, Jackie Robinson, and Muhammad Ali. They are currently in production on a film about Leonardo da Vinci.
Director Ken Burns
Courtesy of Evan Barlow
Ken Burns earned an Academy Award nomination for his first documentary, 1981’s Brooklyn Bridge. He “has gone on to direct and produce some of the most acclaimed historical documentaries ever made,” a release noted, “including The Civil War; Baseball; Jazz; The Statue of Liberty; Huey Long; Lewis & 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… and, most recently, The U.S. and the Holocaust.”
Ken Burns’ films have earned a slew of major awards, among them 16 Emmys, two Grammys, and two Oscar nominations. In September 2008, at the News & Documentary Emmy Awards, Burns was honored by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences with a Lifetime Achievement Award.