Judith Ehrlich is an award-winning documentary filmmaker and progressive activist. She is best known for her work on The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers, which won an Academy Award in 2009.
Ehrlich was born in New York City in 1954 and grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. She attended the University of California, Berkeley and received a BA in English Literature and Creative Writing. After graduation, she traveled to India and Nepal, where she worked as a volunteer for the United Nations High Commission for Refugees.
In the 1980s, Ehrlich began her career as a documentary filmmaker. She produced and co-directed The Good War and Those Who Refused to Fight It, a PBS documentary about conscientious objectors during World War II. She then went on to direct No Secrets, a film about the abortion rights movement in the United States, which was screened at the Sundance Film Festival in 1989.
In 2002, Ehrlich co-directed The Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers with Rick Goldsmith. The film tells the story of Ellsberg's decision to leak the secret Pentagon documents about the Vietnam War to the press. The documentary won numerous awards, including an Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature in 2009.
Ehrlich is also the founder and executive producer of the nonprofit organization The Working Group, which produces documentaries about social issues. Some of their projects include Bay of All Saints, about the lives of three women living in a Brazilian slum, and the Emmy Award-winning series Unnatural Causes, which explores the root causes of health disparities in the United States.
In addition to her filmmaking career, Ehrlich is also a passionate advocate for progressive social change. She is a board member of JustFilms, a Rockefeller Foundation initiative, and also serves on the advisory board of the International Documentary Association.
Ehrlich's work is a testament to her commitment to using media to create positive social change. She is an inspiration to other filmmakers and activists, and her impact will be felt for years to come.
