PBS and AMERICAN EXPERIENCE Announce "Zora Neale Hurston"

New Biography of the Trailblazing Writer and Anthropologist to Premiere in Early 2023 on PBS

(BOSTON, MA) July 27, 2022 - Today at the Television Critics Association Summer Press Tour, PBS and AMERICAN EXPERIENCE announced "Zora Neale Hurston," a new biography of the influential author whose groundbreaking anthropological work would challenge assumptions about race, gender and cultural superiority that had long defined the field in the 19th century. Directed by Tracy Heather Strain, produced by Randall MacLowry and executive produced by Cameo George, the film will premiere in early 2023 on PBS, PBS.org and the PBS Video app.

Best remembered for her novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston was a key figure of the Harlem Renaissance. But even as she gained renown in the Harlem literary culture of the 1920s, Hurston was also pursuing anthropological studies at Barnard College. Throughout her career, she struggled for recognition in two worlds - literary and scientific - writing novels and collecting folklore, drawing on her ethnographic expertise to inform her literary artistry. In more than a decade of fieldwork in the American South and the islands of the Caribbean, Hurston carefully documented stories, songs and religious rituals, often immersing herself fully in the cultures she studied. Driving around in a Nash coupe she called "Sassy Susie," she traveled the back roads of her native Florida, later moving on to New Orleans to study hoodoo, or conjure religion, and then on to Haiti. Through her trailblazing work, Hurston would reclaim, honor and celebrate Black life on its own terms - an idea that remains radical today.

"Zora Neale Hurston has long been considered a literary giant of the Harlem renaissance, but her anthropological and ethnographic endeavors were equally important and impactful," says AMERICAN EXPERIENCE executive producer Cameo George. "Her research and writings helped establish the dialects and folklore of African American, Caribbean and African people throughout the American diaspora as components of a rich, distinct culture, anchoring the Black experience in the Americas."

About the Filmmakers

Tracy Heather Strain(Director/Producer), president and co-founder of the Film Posse, is an award-winning filmmaker. Strain directed, wrote and produced Sighted Eyes/Feeling Heart, her feature documentary about Lorraine Hansberry, which made its television debut on AMERICAN MASTERS and won a Peabody Award, an NAACP Image Award for Motion Picture Directing (Television) and the American Historical Association's John E. O'Connor Award. A two-time Emmy-nominated filmmaker, her other directing and producing credits include "When the Bough Breaks" for the duPont Columbia Award-winning series Unnatural Causes: Is Inequality Making Us Sick? and "The Story We Tell" for Race: The Power of an Illusion. She directed, wrote and produced "Bright Like a Sun" and "The Dream Keepers" for Blackside's six-part series I'll Make Me a World: A Century of African American Art, which won a Peabody Award and Organization of American Historians' Erik Barnouw Award. Her other American Experience credits include producer/director Building the Alaska Highway; writer/director/producer of American Oz; producer of Silicon Valley; and coordinating producer of The Feud, The Swamp, The Battle of Chosin, The Mine Wars and The Rise and Fall of Penn Station. Strain serves on the faculty of Wesleyan University's College of Film and the Moving Image.

Randall MacLowry (Producer) is an award-winning filmmaker who crafts documentaries at the Film Posse, the production company he co-founded with his wife and business partner Tracy Heather Strain. A director, writer, producer and editor with over 30 years of experience, MacLowry's credits include films for the PBS series American Experience, most recently American Oz, The Feud, The Swamp and The Battle of Chosin; NOVA, AMERICAN MASTERS, Unnatural Causes: Is Inequality Making Us Sick? and Race: The Power of an Illusion. With Strain, MacLowry produced and edited the critically acclaimed Sighted Eyes/Feeling Heart, which had its world premiere at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival and won a Peabody Award. MacLowry has received two Writers Guild Awards, and two of his American Experience films won the Organization for American Historians' Erik Barnouw Award. MacLowry serves on the faculty of Wesleyan University's College of Film and the Moving Image.

Cameo George (Executive Producer, American Experience) is an Emmy Award-winning producer, writer and journalist with more than 20 years of experience in documentary, broadcast television and digital content production. George has produced, developed and commissioned innovative programming at CNN, NBC News and ABC News. She was the senior producer of CNN's groundbreaking series Black in America and Latino in America and executive producer of the eight-hour PBS documentary series 16 FOR '16: THE CONTENDERS, which was also broadcast on the BBC. George joined American Experience from ABC News, where she was head of development for long-form projects, responsible for creating a pipeline of docuseries and feature documentary films across Walt Disney Television platforms, including ABC News, Hulu, National Geographic and Disney+.

About American Experience

For more than 30 years, American Experience has been television's most-watched history series, bringing to life the incredible characters and epic stories that have shaped America's past and present. American Experience documentaries have been honored with every major broadcast award, including 30 Emmy Awards, five duPont-Columbia Awards and 19 George Foster Peabody Awards. PBS's signature history series also creates original digital content that innovates new forms of storytelling to connect our collective past with the present. Cameo George is the series executive producer. American Experience is produced for PBS by GBH Boston. Visit pbs.org/americanexperience and follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube to learn more.

Major funding for AMERICAN EXPERIENCE provided by Liberty Mutual Insurance and by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. Additional funding provided by the Robert David Lion Gardiner Foundation, the Documentary Investment Group, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and public television viewers.

About PBS

PBS, with more than 330 member stations, offers all Americans the opportunity to explore new ideas and new worlds through television and digital content. Each month, PBS reaches over 120 million people through television and 26 million people online, inviting them to experience the worlds of science, history, nature and public affairs; to hear diverse viewpoints; and to take front row seats to world-class drama and performances. PBS' broad array of programs has been consistently honored by the industry's most coveted award competitions. Teachers of children from pre-K through 12th grade turn to PBS for digital content and services that help bring classroom lessons to life. Decades of research confirms that PBS' premier children's media service, PBS KIDS, helps children build critical literacy, math and social-emotional skills, enabling them to find success in school and life. Delivered through member stations, PBS KIDS offers high-quality educational content on TV - including a 24/7 channel, online at pbskids.org, via an array of mobile apps and in communities across America. More information about PBS is available at www.pbs.org, one of the leading dot-org websites on the internet, or by following PBS on Twitter, Facebook or through our apps for mobile and connected devices. Specific program information and updates for press are available at pbs.org/pressroom or by following PBS Communications on Twitter.