Filmmaker finds life's a blast in the classroom

Stanley Nelson has a slew of awards to his name. A widely respected documentary filmmaker, he scored an Emmy, a Peabody and prizes from the Sundance Film Festival and the International Documentary Association for just one film, “The Murder of Emmett Till.” The 2003 documentary about the 1955 murder of a 14-year-old black boy influenced the reopening of the case against acquitted—but admittedly guilty—white murderers. Other awards include a MacArthur fellowship in 2002 and honors from the Council on Foundations, CINE (Council on International Non-Theatrical Events) and the Black Filmmaker’s Hall of Fame, among many others. Nelson was even named one of the “men we love” by Essence magazine last year.

While he appreciates this recognition, Nelson seems equally excited about his new position as the Belle Zeller visiting professor in public policy and administration at Brooklyn College-City University of New York. The position is named for the founding president of the Professional Staff Congress/AFT.

“I’m loving teaching,” says Nelson, who has one class in film and another in political science. “It’s just been a blast.” Recognizing that his “visiting professor” status sets him apart from academic colleagues—a group he addresses in the film “Shattering the Silences: The Case for Minority Faculty”—he appreciates campus life that much more. “You get a lot of respect,” he says. He has considerable impact on students who ask for advice, and enjoys the one-on-one contact he misses in film.

Nelson earned a BFA in film at the City College of New York, and was a fellow at the American Film Institute, a Revson fellow at Columbia University, a regent’s lecturer at the University of California and taught film at Howard University. His films, produced through his Brooklyn-based business Firelight Media, are dedicated to “telling stories of people, places, cultures, and issues ... underrepresented in mainstream media,” according to his Web site. Among them: “A Place of Our Own,” describing the black middle class; “Running: The Campaign for City Council,” on New York campaign finance reform; “Marcus Garvey: Look for Me in the Whirlwind;” and “The Black Press: Soldiers without Swords.” Many of his films air on PBS.

As Nelson works, he strives to burst the “historical bubble” to find pieces of the past that resonate with audiences today. Great films, he says, require three elements: entertainment, education and a message, “a point for being there.” They take at least a year before they’ve been financed and produced, and for Nelson to make that kind of commitment, they must have a reason for being, he says: “It would be hard to work on a film for six or seven years that is a piece of beautiful fluff.”

Of special interest to educators is Firelight Media’s recent “Schools for a New Society,” which follows four students in three cities to explore high school reform. There’s also “Jonestown,” for PBS’s American Experience series, and a film in progress about the activists who form the a cappella group Sweet Honey in the Rock.

Although he is a filmmaker first, Nelson would like to spend more time teaching. “Filmmaking is taxing, physically,” he says. “I’ve always thought that … down the road [I’d] head more toward teaching.” His position at Brooklyn may be just the beginning of a long segue into education, this time offscreen and in the classroom.