Alexander Calder
an American Masters special, is the first definitive portrait of the inventor of the mobile, a co-production of American Masters and Florentine Films/ Sherman Pictures LLC. The one-hour PBS program shows Calder at work in his studio, and features never before seen archival films and photographs. It includes contemporary shooting of dozens of works, seen as Calder meant them to be viewed, in dynamic motion. Interviews include: Arthur Miller, Ellsworth Kelly, I.M. Pei, Brendan Gill, Marla Prather, David Ross, Calder's daughters and grandson, Sandy Rower and others.
The film received rave reviews including "Pick-of-the-Week" in People and an 'A' in Entertainment Weekly. Sherman made an appearance on Charlie Rose, who called the film "an extraordinary American masterpiece." Legendary agent Robby Lantz said it was "a masterful movie portrait," and Susan Lacy, executive producer of American Masters, described it simply as "the best artist portrait I've ever seen."
*Emmy Award *Peabody Award
*CINE Golden Eagle
*Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival
*World Premiere at the Whitney Museum of American Art
*Screened at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
60 min. - 16mm film
Films
Richard Rodgers: The Sweetest Sounds
The definitive portrait of the most prolific composer of Broadway musicals. Newsday's Noel Holston put the two-hour American Masters PBS production on his 10 Best List, writing, "As memorable and moving as any musical drama you will see and hear anywhere, Broadway included." Tom Shales declared in the Washington Post: "One of the most edifying television events of the year." And Dorothy Rabinowitz, writing in the Wall Street Journal, called it, “an extraordinary film biography, perhaps the best ever produced in the American Masters series.” In live music sessions Andrew Lloyd Weber, Billy Taylor, Maureen McGovern, Mary Cleere Haran and Richard Rodney Bennet musically demonstrate Rodgers’ genius. They speak eloquently about the composer, as do Julie Andrews, Celeste Holm, Shirley Jones, Diahann Carroll, Barbara Cook, John Lahr, Ethan Mordden and Adam Guettel. Also, Rodgers' daughters, Mary and Linda, candidly describe their father's alcoholism and depression. There are rare film clips including Rodgers' talking about his life and work. And, of course, there are the musicals.
* Museum of Modern Art, opened and closed "Isn't It Romantic? Richard Rodgers at the Movies"
* Reel Music Film Festival, Portland, Oregon
* Gold Plaque, Chicago International Film Festival
* Gold Special Jury Award, Worldfest, Houston
* CINE Golden Eagle
* International Festival of Film on Art, Montreal, Canada
* World Premiere, Museum of Television & Radio, New York World Premiere, Museum of Television &
Radio, New York
* Premiere national PBS broadcast: November 4, 2001
120 min.
The Rhythm of My Soul: Kentucky Roots Music
As many or more famous country stars were born and raised in southern and eastern Kentucky as any other place in America. A testament and demonstration of the many aspects of country music: Country, Gospel, Bluegrass, Mountain. Featuring some true national treasures playing and demonstrating including: 77 year old Mountain banjo picker Lee Sexton, 80 year old fiddle maker Buddy Ratcliff who played with Merle Travis, The Tri-City Messengers, a Gospel group made up of retired black coal miners, The Carriere Family with 10 and 12 year old fiddle players Josh and Stacie, Rob McNurlin and The Beatnik Cowboys, Bottomline, fiddlers John Harrod and Jesse Wells, mandolin picker Don Rigsby, dulcimer maker Warren May and others.
Produced for the Southern & Eastern Kentucky Tourism and Development Association.
*Featured Closing Film, Appalachian Film Festival
-Roger Sherman Received a Lifetime Achievement Award
*Opening Night Special Presentation, Tupelo Film Festival
*Best Documentary Sponsored by Acclaimed Studio, Bluegrass Independent Film Festival 2007
60 min. (Plus four 12 min. films to be shown at concert halls throughout the region)
The O.J. Simpson Trial: Beyond Black & White
Surveys the African-American perspective of the celebrated trial. The one-hour program was made for The Learning Channel. Entertainment Weekly called it "provocative and unsettling." In the special blacks discuss how their relationship with the criminal justice system is completely different than it is for whites. It aired three times in prime time and features interviews with Dr. Alvin Poussaint, Nikki Giovanni, Melanie Lomax and others.
*CableAce nominee, 1997
*Gold Medal, New York Festivals
*Finalist, NAMIC Vision Awards, for cultural diversity in Cable programing
*Northampton Film Festival
60 min.
Don't Divorce The Children
An emotional story on the effects of divorce on children, Timothy Busfield, host, produced for Lifetime Television. Told from the children's point of view, without experts, this film has become mandatory viewing in court ordered divorce workshops in a dozen states.
*CableAce nominee
*Winner, Best Documentary, Front Page Film Festival, New York
*Gold Medal, Houston International Film Festival
*Bronze Plaque, Columbus International Film Festival
*Special Citation, National Council on Children's Rights
60 min. - 16mm film
The Garden of Eden
In the next thirty years 20% of all forms of life will no longer exist. The first film showing it can be for good business to save the environment. Discoveries in the plant, animal and microbiology world show that what you might think of as unimportant could be the cure to a major disease, save an entire species of plant or ward off pests.
*Academy Award nominee
*Blue Ribbon, American Film Festival
*Winner, North American Outdoor Academy Awards
*International Wildlife Film Festival
*Ten additional awards and citations.
30 min. - 16mm film
Fast Eddie and the Boys
This intimate portrait of a tight-knit group of wisecracking octogenarians features Fireball Abe, Punch Shot Al and Shmatta Dave literally live for handball. They play hard, recall their childhood games played against tenement walls in New York and Boston, Chicago and Detroit, and feel the poignancy of their dwindling ranks. In their own words, they are "a dying breed." They tell wonderfully embellished stories of injuries and heart attacks suffered on the court, sex after 70, and fortunes won and lost. Viewers hear a stream of banter, bad jokes and macho challenges.
*Winner, New England Film Festival, Best Independent Video
*Motion Picture Arts & Sciences Contemporary Documentary Series
*The South Beach Film Festival
*Portland International Film Festival
*Hamptons International Film Festival
*Silver Images Film Festival
14 minutes
A Dream House
Writer Tom Wolfe, fashion designer Geoffrey Beene, architect Robert A.M. Stern, film production designer Richard Sylbert, cookbook writer Sheila Lukins, painter Kenny Scharf, Chez Panisse owner Alice Waters, artists Daniel Mack and Bennet Bean, floral designers Pure M”derlake, architect Adam Tihany, designers Jed Johnson and Alan Wanzenberg, all design fantasy rooms in a New York City brownstone, to benefit Design Industry Foundation for Aids (DIFFA). The video shows the start to finish transformations and helped raise $1,000,000. Profits from the video go to DIFFA.
13 minutes
Food Fright
A musical comedy about women and their attitude towards food and their bodies. Dramatic. Written by two women, one recovering from bulimia, the other from anorexia, this film aims to reach young women and girls in a new and different manner, through humor.
*CINE Golden Eagle
30 min. - 16mm
The American Brew
This is American History told through beer. Back when the first settlers arrived, beer was a household necessity - drunk my men, women and children - because sanitation was such that drinking water or milk could be deadly. This 60 minute film combines cinéma vérité scenes, archives and interviews that mix history with present day stories.
60 min.
Roger Sherman
Florentine Films / Sherman Pictures, LLC
Roger Sherman
Producer n Director n Cinematographer n Photographer
Florentine Films / Sherman Pictures LLC
Medal of Honor
What makes a person face almost certain death to save the lives of others? Where does one find the strength to endure unspeakable acts of torture at the hands of an enemy and not lose the will to survive? Would we — if put into the same situation — be capable of such heroism? Medal of Honor reveals the almost inconceivable acts of those few heroes who answered “Yes!”
Produced, directed and filmed by Roger Sherman, the 90-minute PBS Special traces the history of the Medal. We’re at Baghdad airport, when Sgt. Paul Smith dies protecting his company. We meet a Holocaust survivor, who, in the Korean War single-handedly defends a hill from advancing enemy forces. A Navy SEAL takes us back to the day in Vietnam when he swam two hours in the ocean, carrying his wounded comrades and saving their lives. A Marine at Iwo Jima recounts his solo attacks that silenced seven Japanese bunkers with a flamethrower, clearing a path for his decimated, demoralized company.
90min