Gary Glassman is a documentary filmmaker based in

Rhode Island Rhode Island (, like ''road'') is a state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is the smallest U.S. state by area and the seventh-least populous, with slightly fewer than 1.1 million residents as of 2020, but i ...

. His company, Providence Pictures, produces films for ''

NOVA A nova (plural novae or novas) is a transient astronomical event that causes the sudden appearance of a bright, apparently "new" star (hence the name "nova", which is Latin for "new") that slowly fades over weeks or months. Causes of the dramati ...

'',

Discovery Channel Discovery Channel (known as The Discovery Channel from 1985 to 1995, and often referred to as simply Discovery) is an American cable channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, a publicly traded company run by CEO David Zaslav. , Discovery Chan ...

History Channel History (formerly The History Channel from January 1, 1995 to February 15, 2008, stylized as HISTORY) is an American pay television network and flagship channel owned by A&E Networks, a joint venture between Hearst Communications and the Dis ...

BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...

, and other television networks and programs.

Early life and education

Glassman became interested in film and entertainment at a young age. After spending three years with a European circus, he completed an MFA program in directing at

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a Normal school, teachers colle ...

. He was attracted to documentary filmmaking because "People have amazing stories, and the world's accumulated knowledge is so rich."

Career

His first documentary, ''Prisoners'', is in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York and the Centre Pompidou in Paris. Glassman started Providence Pictures in 1996, moving to

from Paris when his wife took a job at

Providence College Providence College is a private Catholic university in Providence, Rhode Island. Founded in 1917 by the Dominican Order and the local diocese, it offers 47 undergraduate majors and 17 graduate programs. It requires all of its undergradua ...

. Since then, he has become active in the promotion of the city as a center for digital media and other creative industries, including starting the Digital City project in 2013, with

Renee Hobbs Renee Hobbs is an American scholar and educator who works in the field of media literacy education. She is Professor of Communication Studies at the Harrington School of Communication and Media and founder of the Media Education Lab at the Univers ...

, founder of the

University of Rhode Island The University of Rhode Island (URI) is a public land-grant research university with its main campus in Kingston, Rhode Island, United States. It is the flagship public research as well as the land-grant university of the state of Rhode Island ...

Harrington School of Communication and Media. Glassman's ''The Bible's Buried Secrets'', a 2008 feature on the science series NOVA on PBS, attracted some controversy for its provocative ideas, including the idea of God having a wife. According to the ''Christian Post'', Biblical scholar William G. Dever said some bible literalists may call the film "shocking" but he said the film was the best documentary ever made on the origins of the Israelites and the writing of the first five books of the Bible, and contrasted it positively with several other similar films he was involved with, which he considered to be dishonest. The

American Family Association The American Family Association (AFA) is a Christian fundamentalist 501(c)(3) organization based in the United States.

protested the film, urging Congress to stop providing funding to PBS. Glassman won the 2009

Writers Guild of America Award The Writers Guild of America Awards is an award for film, television, and radio writing including both fiction and non-fiction categories given by the Writers Guild of America, East and Writers Guild of America West since 1949. Eligibility Th ...

for best documentary on a subject other than current events for ''Secrets of the Parthenon'', produced for

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly funded nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of ed ...

's ''Nova''. Glassman and Providence Pictures went to the

Colosseum The Colosseum ( ; it, Colosseo ) is an oval amphitheatre in the centre of the city of Rome, Italy, just east of the Roman Forum. It is the largest ancient amphitheatre ever built, and is still the largest standing amphitheatre in the world ...

Rome , established_title = Founded , established_date = 753 BC , founder = King Romulus ( legendary) , image_map = Map of comune of Rome (metropolitan city of Capital Rome, region Lazio, Italy).svg , map_caption ...

to install a replica of the wooden elevator used by the Romans to move animals into the center of the arena, and produced the documentary ''Colosseum: Roman Death Trap'' about the project. It was one of a series of documentaries the company did for ''NOVA'' called "Building Wonders". One of his favorite of his films is ''Secret of Photo 51'', about

Rosalind Franklin Rosalind Elsie Franklin (25 July 192016 April 1958) was a British chemist and X-ray crystallographer whose work was central to the understanding of the molecular structures of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid), RNA (ribonucleic acid), viruses, c ...

's importance in the discovery of the DNA

double helix A double is a look-alike or doppelgänger; one person or being that resembles another. Double, The Double or Dubble may also refer to: Film and television * Double (filmmaking), someone who substitutes for the credited actor of a character * ...

that Watson & Crick took credit for.

References

External links

*
Providence Pictures
{{DEFAULTSORT:Glassman, Gary Year of birth missing (living people) American documentary filmmakers Living people Artists from Providence, Rhode Island Place of birth missing (living people) UCLA Film School alumni