Filmmaker Marcia Smith Tells Doc Distributors to Be ‘Courageous’ Despite Trump’s Election

At Wednesday’s annual DOC NYC Visionaries Tribute Luncheon, over 500 of the documentary community’s best and brightest attempted to remain positive about the future of not only docus, but also America under Donald Trump‘s leadership.

The Gotham Hall gala, which marked the opening day of the 15th annual DOC NYC film festival, attracted filmmakers with documentaries vying for a spot on the Oscar shortlist, including R.J. Cutler (“Martha”), Alexis Bloom (“The Bibi Files”), Hasan Oswald (“Mediha”), Carla Gutiérrez (“Frida”) and Shiori Ito (“Black Box Diaries”). The luncheon also drew hundreds of docu cinematographers, producers, editors, publicists, distributors, and perhaps most importantly, an abundance of Academy doc branch members.

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During her speech, Lifetime Achievement honoree Marcia Smith, Firelight Media president/co-founder, relayed her concerns for the doc community at large.

“Friends have been laid off, whole doc divisions eliminated or consolidated, budgets have shrunk, and juicy festival sales have been few and far between,” Smith said. “Most importantly, the range of subject matter that is seen as deserving of support has narrowed. You know the saying in broadcast news, ‘If it bleeds, it leads.’ Well, today, the doc equivalent might be, ‘If it’s a true crime, scandal, or celebrity, it just might sell.’ These are the things we talked about over the last few years. These were the worries of 2023 and early 2024. That was before the election. Now, this week, when we think about the future of our field, things seem much more stark. There’s a prospect of continued contraction and even further narrowing of priorities on the commercial side. But now public television, which as quiet as it’s kept, has long been the biggest single distributor of independent documentaries, will now face the greatest threat since its founding in 1969.”

Smith, who has written for several of Firelight’s docus including “The Murder of Emmett Till” and “The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution,” added that the doc community’s fears are now “more visceral” than ever before.

“[Our fears] are less about job security or career survival and now more about actual, literal survival,” she said. “We fear for ourselves, our friends, our neighbors. We wonder who of us will be targeted first, and we wonder if our allies will be there when our time comes. For those of us in the field of documentary, the moment presents an acute challenge but also an opportunity and obligation. After all, we are the ones who wield images and sound to tell real stories that enlighten and inspire, stories that powerfully influence how and when we see humanity in one another. We are the ones who believe that documentaries can change the world.”

Smith called on docu distribution gatekeepers to be “courageous when it feels risky.”

“Fight for the stories and the storytellers we need to hear from,” she said. “Fight for filmmakers with bold visions and stories we’ve never seen, rather than stories we believe an audience will watch, cause they’ve watched ten others like it”

Smith received a standing ovation at the end of her 12-minute acceptance speech.

Fellow Visionaries Tribute gala honorees included filmmaker Alan Berliner, Lucy Walker and CEO of Chicken & Egg Pictures Jenni Wolfson.

DOC NYC’s 2024 festival concludes on Nov. 21. The in-person events will take place at New York City’s IFC Center, SVA Theatre and Village East by Angelika. The fest’s online presentations will extend through Dec. 1, with online screenings available to viewers across the U.S.