In 1981, 11,345 air traffic controllers stood in solidarity on strike, defying President Reagan’s order to return to work; he fired them en masse, forever altering each of their lives and the entire American labor landscape for the next four decades. The Last Strike uses a wealth of long-buried archival materials and groundbreaking interview techniques with the key players from all sides of the story to take viewers inside the strike that changed everything, unravelling the mystery behind the moment American unions were nearly crushed.
More information available on the film’s Website.
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DANNY ALPERT, PRODUCER/DIRECTOR
DANNY ALPERT is an award-winning producer, director, and leader in using media for change. He recently directed NoSmallMatter which has hosted over 1,250 community screenings across the US after arelease in late 2018. Past films include RADICAL GRACE, which won audience awards at HotDocs and AFI Film Festivals, THE CALLING, a national PBS special (Independent Lens) and @HOMELAND A DOULA STORY, both of which aired on PBS. He co-produced and edited LEGACY (HBO), which was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary and premiered at Sundance. Alpert also produced and directed NO TIME TO BE A CHILD, a national PBS series that was nominated for a national Emmy Award. Alpert also pushes the boundaries of documentaries, with digital projects, like CPB’s VETERANS COMING HOME, and PULLING THE THREAD, with ITVS and has produced media and digital strategies for social causes like UNICEF, Planned Parenthood, American Cancer Society and many others.
RAY NOWOSIELSKI, DIRECTOR
RAY NOWOSIELSKI is an Emmy nominated filmmaker who has served as a director, producer, consulting producer and writer on the productions of Academy Award winners Art Bilger, Rob Epstein, Jeffrey Friedman, Alex Gibney and Barbara Kopple and nominee Morgan Spurlock. Ray’s directing debut, PRESS FOR TRUTH premiered on Al Jazeera Television in 2006. He directed on the Emmy-nominated 3rd season of VICE on HBO and produced for the Webby-winning online series WE THE ECONOMY. In 2014, he began a string of collaborations with Kopple, first as consulting producer for her Emmy and NAACP Image Award nominated film, MISS SHARON JONES!, then producing two 2018 releases, a News and Documentary Emmy-nominated Netflix Original about Johnny Cash,Tricky Dick & the Man in Black, and an Investigation Discovery true-crime film, A MURDER IN MANSFIELD. Most recently he co-produced DESERT ONE, featuring an original interview with President Jimmy Carter and premiering at TIFF.
ADAM MCKAY, EXECTUIVE PRODUCER
ADAM MCKAY