Biography
Ken Burns (born 1953) is a highly celebrated American documentarian who gradually amassed a considerable reputation and a devoted audience with a series of reassuringly traditional meditations on Americana. Burns' works are treasure troves of archival materials; he skillfully utilizes period music and footage, photographs, periodicals and ordinary people's correspondence, the latter often movingly read by seasoned professional actors in a deliberate attempt to get away from a "Great Man" approach to history. Like most non-fiction filmmakers, Burns wears many hats on his projects, often serving as writer, cinematographer, editor and music director in addition to producing and directing. He achieved his apotheosis with The Civil War (1990), a phenomenally popular 11-hour documentary that won two Emmys and broke all previous ratings records for public TV. The series' companion coffee table book--priced at a hefty $50--sold more than 700,000 copies. The audio version, narrated by Burns, was also a major best-seller. In the final accounting, "The Civil War" became the first documentary to gross over $100 million. Not surprisingly, it has become perennial fund-raising programming for public TV stations around the country. Burns arrived upon the scene with the Oscar-nominated Brooklyn Bridge (1981), a nostalgic chronicle of the construction of the fabled edifice. The film was more widely seen when rebroadcast on PBS the following year. Though Burns has made other nonfiction films for theatrical release, notably an acclaimed and ambiguous portrait of Depression-era Louisiana governor Huey Long (1985), PBS would prove to be his true home. He cast a probing eye on such American subjects as The Statue of Liberty (1985), The Congress (1988) (PBS), painter Thomas Hart Benton (1988) (PBS) and early radio with Empire of the Air: The Men Who Made Radio (1991) (PBS). Burns returned to long-form documentary with his most ambitious project to date, an 18-hour history of Baseball (1994), which aired on PBS in the fall of 1994. He approached the national pastime as a template for understanding changes in modern American society. Ironically, this was the only baseball on the air at the time, as the players and owners were embroiled in a bitter strike.
Filmography
all 88
TV Shows 52
Movies 36
Director 30
self 28
Producer 21
Creator 1
Writer 1
In the Know (2024)
Die USA und der Holocaust (Arte) (2023)
The American Buffalo (2023)
The U.S. and the Holocaust (2022)
Hiding in Plain Sight: Youth Mental Illness (2022)
Benjamin Franklin (2022)
Who's Talking to Chris Wallace? (2022)
The Unmaking of a College (2022)
Muhammad Ali (2021)
Back on the Record with Bob Costas (2021)
De la poussière et des hommes (2021)
Hemingway (2021)
Ken Burns: Here & There (2020)
Here For A Good Time (2020)
The Gene: An Intimate History (2020)
East Lake Meadows: A Public Housing Story (2020)
College Behind Bars (2019)
Country Music by Ken Burns (2019)
Very Ralph (2019)
Country Music (2019)
Country Music: Live at the Ryman (2019)
The Mayo Clinic (2018)
Firing Line with Margaret Hoover (2018)
The Vietnam War (2017)
Ken Burns: America's Storyteller (2017)
Defying the Nazis: The Sharps' War (2016)
Jackie Robinson (2016)
The Late Show with Stephen Colbert (2015)
Cancer: The Emperor of All Maladies (2015)
Interstellar (2014)
OETA's On The Record: Ken Burns (2014)
The Roosevelts: An Intimate History (2014)
The Address (2014)
The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon (2014)
Yosemite — A Gathering of Spirit (2013)
The Dust Bowl (2012)
Plimpton! Starring George Plimpton as Himself (2012)
The Mindy Project (2012)
The Central Park Five (2012)
Finding Your Roots (2012)
Prohibition (2011)
Baseball: The Tenth Inning (2010)
Baseball: The Tenth Inning (2010)
A Hall for Heroes: The Inaugural Hall of Fame Induction of 1939 (2010)
The National Parks: America's Best Idea (2009)
MLB: Baseball's Seasons (2009)
The War (2008)
Episode 5 - FUBAR (September - December 1944) (2007)
Episode 4 - Pride of Our Nation (June - August 1944) (2007)
Craft in America (2007)
Wordplay (2006)
The Colbert Report (2005)
The Tim McCarver Show (2005)
Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson (2005)
The Tony Danza Show (2004)
Unforgivable Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson (2004)
Horatio's Drive: America's First Road Trip (2003)
Boston Red Sox: 100 Years of Baseball History (2002)
Mark Twain (2002)
Mark Twain (2002)
Jazz (2001)
Chuck Jones: Extremes and In-Betweens - A Life in Animation (2000)
Seeing, Searching, Being: William Segal (2000)
Not for Ourselves Alone: The Story of Elizabeth Cady Stanton & Susan B. Anthony (1999)
Frank Lloyd Wright (1998)
Lewis & Clark: The Journey of the Corps of Discovery (1997)
Lewis & Clark - The Journey of the Corps of Discovery (1997)
Thomas Jefferson (1997)
The West (1996)
The Daily Show (1996)
Baseball (1994)
Late Night with Conan O'Brien (1993)
Empire of the Air: The Men Who Made Radio (1991)
Lindbergh (1990)
The Civil War (1990)
The Simpsons (1989)
Thomas Hart Benton (1989)
The Congress (1989)
The Statue of Liberty (1985)
Huey Long (1985)
The Shakers: Hands to Work, Hearts to God (1984)
This Week with David Brinkley (1981)
Brooklyn Bridge (1981)
CNN Special Report (1980)
60 Minutes (1968)
The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson (1962)
Today (1952)
Henry Louis Gates Jr.: Uncovering America
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Information
Known ForDirecting
GenderMale
Birthday1953-07-29 (70 years old)
Birth NameKenneth Lauren Burns
Birth PlaceBrooklyn, United States of America
ChildrenSarah Burns
FatherRobert Kyle Burns
MotherLynn Smith Burns
CitizenshipsUnited States of America
ResidencesBrooklyn · Ann Arbor · Walpole, United States of America
AwardsLady Bird Johnson Environmental Award, Jefferson Lecture, Grammy Award for Best Traditional Folk Album, Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album, Grammy Award for Best Audio Book, Narration & Storytelling Recording, Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Lincoln Prize, Guggenheim Fellowship, Emmy Award, Charles Frankel Prize, National Humanities Medal, Christopher Award
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