Julia Reichert, Oscar-winning documentarian, dies at 76

By Associated Press

Julia Reichert, the Oscar-winning documentary filmmaker behind “American Factory” whose movies explored themes of race, class and gender, typically within the Midwest, has died. She was 76.

She died Thursday evening in Ohio from most cancers, her household mentioned Friday via a consultant. She was recognized with stage 4 urothelial most cancers in April 2018.

Often known as the “godmother of American independent documentaries,” Reichart advised the tales of atypical Americans, from autoworkers coping with each plant closures (2009′s “The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant”) and overseas traders (2019′s “American Factory”), to members of the American Communist Party (1983′s “Seeing Red”) to feminine labor activists within the Thirties (1976′s “Union Maids”).

In her 50 years of filmmaking, Reichert gained two Primetime Emmy Awards and was nominated for 4 Oscars, successful one along with her accomplice Steven Bognar for “American Factory” in 2020. She quoted “The Communist Manifesto” in her speech, saying “things will get better when workers of the world unite.”

She was additionally nominated for 2 Peabody Awards.

Veteran movie producer Ira Deutchman wrote on Twitter that she was one in every of “the kindest, most generous people I’ve ever had the pleasure to work with.”

“Her spirit was so indomitable that somehow I thought she would eventually triumph over her illness,” he added. “I will miss her so much.”

“RBG” director Julie Cohen tweeted that she was “reflecting on the life of a woman who made an enormous contribution to the world of documentary. And the world generally.”

Born in 1946 in Princeton, New Jersey, and raised in Bordentown and Long Beach Island along with her three brothers, Reichert began discovering her voice as a filmmaker at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, starting her lengthy residency within the state.

Her first movie, “Growing Up Female” was a 49-minute scholar movie made for $2,000 with then-partner Jim Klein that appeared on the lives of six ladies, ages 4 via 35, and their socialization.

When they couldn’t discover distribution, they based their very own firm, New Day Films, which remains to be energetic to today. In 2011, “Growing Up Female” was added to the Library of Congress’s National Film Registry and is taken into account the primary function documentary of the fashionable ladies’s liberation motion.

“I came of age in the ’60s. Millions of us saw racism, saw U.S. domination around the world. Imperialism. Saw huge inequalities class-wise. We said the system’s not working and we became, in some broad sense, revolutionaries,” Reichert advised the radio station WYSO final yr. “Not that we wanted to attack the White House but we really wanted to change society.”

She and Bognar labored for eight years to make the 225-minute-long, Primetime Emmy Award-winning “A Lion in the House,” which checked out 5 households coping with childhood most cancers in Ohio.

“American Factory” put Reichert and Bognar in a distinct sort of highlight when Barack and Michelle Obama took curiosity of their movie about an Ohio auto glass manufacturing unit that had been bought by a Chinese investor. It turned the primary venture the Obamas backed with their manufacturing firm Higher Ground.

“One of the many things I love about this film … is that you let people tell their own story,” the previous first girl mentioned in 2019. ”‘American Factory’ doesn’t are available in with a perspective. It’s not an editorial. I imply, you really let folks communicate for themselves, and that could be a highly effective factor that you simply don’t at all times see occur.”

More just lately Reichert and Bognar directed “9to5: The Story of a Movement,” about a company that’s making an attempt to enhance working circumstances and preserve rights for girls and households, and “Dave Chappelle: Live in Real Life,” following the comic’s Yellow Springs exhibits in 2020 in the course of the pandemic.

Throughout her profession, Reichert made positive to cross on her knowledge to others, instructing movie at Wright State University from 1985 via 2016 and writing a e book about self-distribution known as “Doing It Yourself.”

Reichert had been recognized with stage 4 non-Hodgkin lymphoma in January 2006, whereas getting ready to go to Sundance with “A Lion in the House,” however went into remission later that yr.

The urothelial most cancers, she knew, was incurable. In 2020, she advised NPR’s Terry Gross that now that she was coming to the top of her life, she was specializing in issues she hadn’t been capable of do sufficient whereas making movies, like spending time along with her daughter and grandchildren.

Reichert is survived by Bognar, her daughter Lela Klein Holt and two grandchildren.

Julia Reichert, the Oscar-winning documentary filmmaker behind “American Factory” whose movies explored themes of race, class and gender, typically within the Midwest, has died. She was 76.

She died Thursday evening in Ohio from most cancers, her household mentioned Friday via a consultant. She was recognized with stage 4 urothelial most cancers in April 2018.

Often known as the “godmother of American independent documentaries,” Reichart advised the tales of atypical Americans, from autoworkers coping with each plant closures (2009′s “The Last Truck: Closing of a GM Plant”) and overseas traders (2019′s “American Factory”), to members of the American Communist Party (1983′s “Seeing Red”) to feminine labor activists within the Thirties (1976′s “Union Maids”).

In her 50 years of filmmaking, Reichert gained two Primetime Emmy Awards and was nominated for 4 Oscars, successful one along with her accomplice Steven Bognar for “American Factory” in 2020. She quoted “The Communist Manifesto” in her speech, saying “things will get better when workers of the world unite.”

She was additionally nominated for 2 Peabody Awards.

Veteran movie producer Ira Deutchman wrote on Twitter that she was one in every of “the kindest, most generous people I’ve ever had the pleasure to work with.”

“Her spirit was so indomitable that somehow I thought she would eventually triumph over her illness,” he added. “I will miss her so much.”

“RBG” director Julie Cohen tweeted that she was “reflecting on the life of a woman who made an enormous contribution to the world of documentary. And the world generally.”

Born in 1946 in Princeton, New Jersey, and raised in Bordentown and Long Beach Island along with her three brothers, Reichert began discovering her voice as a filmmaker at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, starting her lengthy residency within the state.

Her first movie, “Growing Up Female” was a 49-minute scholar movie made for $2,000 with then-partner Jim Klein that appeared on the lives of six ladies, ages 4 via 35, and their socialization.

When they couldn’t discover distribution, they based their very own firm, New Day Films, which remains to be energetic to today. In 2011, “Growing Up Female” was added to the Library of Congress’s National Film Registry and is taken into account the primary function documentary of the fashionable ladies’s liberation motion.

“I came of age in the ’60s. Millions of us saw racism, saw U.S. domination around the world. Imperialism. Saw huge inequalities class-wise. We said the system’s not working and we became, in some broad sense, revolutionaries,” Reichert advised the radio station WYSO final yr. “Not that we wanted to attack the White House but we really wanted to change society.”

She and Bognar labored for eight years to make the 225-minute-long, Primetime Emmy Award-winning “A Lion in the House,” which checked out 5 households coping with childhood most cancers in Ohio.

“American Factory” put Reichert and Bognar in a distinct sort of highlight when Barack and Michelle Obama took curiosity of their movie about an Ohio auto glass manufacturing unit that had been bought by a Chinese investor. It turned the primary venture the Obamas backed with their manufacturing firm Higher Ground.

“One of the many things I love about this film … is that you let people tell their own story,” the previous first girl mentioned in 2019. ”‘American Factory’ doesn’t are available in with a perspective. It’s not an editorial. I imply, you really let folks communicate for themselves, and that could be a highly effective factor that you simply don’t at all times see occur.”

More just lately Reichert and Bognar directed “9to5: The Story of a Movement,” about a company that’s making an attempt to enhance working circumstances and preserve rights for girls and households, and “Dave Chappelle: Live in Real Life,” following the comic’s Yellow Springs exhibits in 2020 in the course of the pandemic.

Throughout her profession, Reichert made positive to cross on her knowledge to others, instructing movie at Wright State University from 1985 via 2016 and writing a e book about self-distribution known as “Doing It Yourself.”

Reichert had been recognized with stage 4 non-Hodgkin lymphoma in January 2006, whereas getting ready to go to Sundance with “A Lion in the House,” however went into remission later that yr.

The urothelial most cancers, she knew, was incurable. In 2020, she advised NPR’s Terry Gross that now that she was coming to the top of her life, she was specializing in issues she hadn’t been capable of do sufficient whereas making movies, like spending time along with her daughter and grandchildren.

Reichert is survived by Bognar, her daughter Lela Klein Holt and two grandchildren.