Marilyn and Hal Weiner are among the world's most honored documentary filmmakers. Through their Washington, D.C.-based production company, Screenscope, they have produced, written, and directed more than 225 documentaries and four public television series (Journey To Planet Earth, Women At Work, Faces Of Man and The World Of Cooking). They also have produced three feature films (Family Business, The Imagemaker, and K2).
Their current PBS series, Journey To Planet Earth, is narrated and hosted by Academy Award winner Matt Damon. They are currently in production on the 14th episode of the series. In North America, each episode reaches an average audience of about 3.1 million viewers. The series is also broadcast in most major overseas television markets, yielding a worldwide television audience of more than 40 million viewers per episode.
Marilyn and Hal Weiner's feature films include their highly acclaimed PBS/American Playhouse film, Family Business. Based upon an off-Broadway show, the film was listed in the top ten television features of the year by The Hollywood Reporter, TV Guide, and many major newspaper film critics. This was followed by The Imagemaker, a thriller exposing, as Variety put it, "the incestuous relationship between the press and politicos in the nation's capital." Critic Archer Winsten in the New York Post said: "Director-writer Hal Weiner has fashioned a hard-hitting, real melodrama of news-making maneuvers in the nation's capital." Their most recent feature was the $16 million Paramount Pictures production of K2. Based upon the Tony award-winning Broadway show, K2 is a mountain climbing drama set against the staggering backdrop of the world's second tallest peak.
The Weiners have won Emmy Awards for The Earth Summit Pledge, commissioned by the United Nations to open the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, and Streets of Sorrow, a documentary about a support group formed to help people cope with the violent death of a family member. They are recipients of the National Academy of Television Arts and Science's Silver Circle Award for "outstanding contributions to the television industry." Marilyn Weiner is the winner of Women In Film & Video's (WIFV) "Women of Vision Award" for creative excellence. In a contest sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts and the PEN/Faulkner Foundation, Hal Weiner won first prize at the 18th annual Larry Neal Writers' Competition for his dramatic screenplay, The Jerusalem Syndrome. Hal also won first prize in the Washington, D.C. Screenwriting Competition for his feature film scripts Shadows and The Katrina Dolphins. The Weiners have also won more than 130 top international awards, including 39 CINE Golden Eagles. Their films have been shot on location in more than 30 countries on five continents, translated into numerous languages, and broadcast throughout the world.
Marilyn Weiner was appointed by Mayors Anthony Williams and Marion Barry and served as a D.C. Commissioner for the Arts and Humanities for six years. She served on the Board of Directors of Filmfest DC, the Committee To Promote Washington, D.C, the Washington Urban League, WIFV, and the Woolly Mammoth Theater Company. She has been President of the Washington Film Council, Vice-President of WIFV, consultant to the National Commission on Working Women, Chairperson of the Advisory Committee to the D.C. Office of Motion Picture and Television Development, and Panelist for both the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Hal Weiner is the founder of the Independent Media Producer's Association. He served on the Board of Directors of the Council on Non-Theatrical Events and the Washington Urban League and was an Honorary Advisor to American University's School of Communications. Several years ago he was invited to testify before the House of Representative's Commerce Committee about national security issues and the availability of the world's drinking water.
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