Black Public Media to honor trailblazing filmmaker Sam Pollard in April 2024
Black Public Media (BPM) will pay tribute to veteran filmmaker Sam Pollard at its PitchBLACK Awards on Thursday, April 25. The ceremony, taking place at the Stanley H. Kantor Penthouse of Manhattan’s Lincoln Center, caps BPM’s seventh PitchBLACK Forum — the largest pitch competition of its kind in the United States for independent filmmakers and creative technologists who create Black content. PitchBLACK kicks off on Wednesday, April 24 with participants competing for awards of up to $150,000 in production and distribution awards for stories about the Black experience.
A multiple Emmy- and Peabody Award-winning producer-director-editor, Pollard is known for his work on a plethora of important works including: Eyes On The Prize, Maynard, MLK/FBI, Lowndes County and the Road to Black Power and Mr. SOUL! He also has served as an editor on Spike Lee’s Clockers; Mo' Better Blues, Jungle Fever, Girl 6, Bamboozled and Four Little Girls. This year alone, the prolific filmmaker’s works include Carlos (Prime Video), about the famed guitarist Carlos Santana; Max Roach: The Drum Also Waltzes (PBS), about the legendary jazz drummer and composer, which just won a 2023 International Documentary Association (IDA) Best Music Documentary Award; and South to Black Power (HBO), about journalist and author Charles M. Blow’s call for Black people to reverse-migrate to the South as a strategy for Black Liberation.
Pollard joins the ranks of previous BPM Trailblazer Award winners: Orlando Bagwell, Joe Brewster, Yoruba Richen, Michèle Stephenson and Marco Williams, all fêted for their long-standing work, primarily in public media, as a producer, director, writer or editor, and for having a strong track record of mentoring the next generation of media makers.
“Sam has continuously brought to life urgent Black stories that need to be seen and studied, crafting films that preserve the history and beauty of so many aspects of American culture,” said Leslie Fields-Cruz, executive director of BPM. “He has also helped to prepare a new wave of truly talented storytellers. It’s time for all of us to give him the flowers he deserves.”
As part of BPM’s PitchBLACK Trailblazer celebration, a select slate of Pollard’s films will be showcased in a special film retrospective. The program features a combination of in-person and virtual screenings as well as a conversation with the filmmaker. BPM will announce details about the screening locations, dates and films included in the Sam Pollard PitchBLACK Trailblazer Retrospective in the spring.
BPM is a Harlem-based national nonprofit which funds and distributes original content, and produces compelling work, including its signature series AfroPoP: The Ultimate Cultural Exchange.