About the Interviewer

Award-winning, acclaimed filmmaker Dawn Porter is a leader in the entertainment industry in the art of storytelling, directing and producing critically acclaimed projects that have impacted generations of people from all walks of life. As a four - time Sundance film festival director, Porter’s work has been featured on HBO, Netflix, Amazon, CNN, PBS, MSNBC, MTV Films, and other platforms. Her newest HBO documentary “When A Witness Recants” premiered at the 2026 Sundance Film Festival.

Recently, Porter was awarded the National Humanities Medal by former President Joe Biden, and elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. She has been recognized with career achievement awards from the IDA, as well as the Hamptons and Mill Valley Film Festivals. Her recent work, The Sing Sing Chronicles won the Best Documentary Emmy at the 46th annual News & Documentary Emmy Awards. Porter’s other recent work, Luther: Never Too Much, highlighting the life and legacy of Luther Vandross premiered on CNN/MAX on January 1, 2025.

Porter’s first film Gideon's Army was nominated for an Emmy and an Independent Spirit Award and won the prestigious Ridenhour Prize as well as the American Bar Association's Silver Gavel Award. Her celebrated documentaries, like Trapped, John Lewis: Good Trouble, and The Lady Bird Diaries, aired on various platforms including HBO, Netflix, Amazon, Apple, CNN, PBS and others. Trapped also earned a Silver Gavel, as well as a Peabody Award and the Sundance Special Jury Prize for Social Impact Filmmaking, while John Lewis: Good Trouble won the 2021 NAACP Image Award. She received the Critics' Choice Impact Award in 2022 and Gracie Awards in both 2022 and 2023.