GBH is pausing new episodes of American Experience, public television’s signature documentary series about American history, following Congress’ move to zero out federal funding for stations, NPR and PBS.
The move comes just as the U.S. is preparing for celebrations marking the 250th anniversary of the country’s birth.
Susan Goldberg, the president and CEO of GBH, said in a statement, “Severe cuts in federal funding for public media are requiring the system – including PBS and GBH – to make difficult decisions about programming and staffing at American Experience.”
She said that American Experience will present its 37th season this fall as planned, with one of the projects including a documentary on the life of Henry Kissinger. She said that next year, “the series will broadcast and stream a collection of the best and most popular American Experience films, and offer vivid digital content for America’s 250th anniversary.”
Goldberg said, “It will also be a year to research and create, and evaluate ways to present content that connects all Americans to a shared history. PBS & GBH believe history is essential to our education mission; we’ll continue to innovate new approaches for American Experience to explore compelling topics, tell stories known and never heard before and grow our audiences.”
She added, “Innovation is paramount in this moment of upheaval. We need to do everything we can to ensure we can be here for generations to come.”
GBH, which is formerly WGBH, also cut 13 employees at the series, according to a repot from the station’s news division.
Last week, Congress approved Donald Trump‘s request to rescind federal funding to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which distributes money to public stations, PBS and NPR. The $1.1 billion over the next two years had already been allocated by lawmakers in previous budget votes.
The decision to pause American Experience was met with some pushback among filmmakers.Documentary director Stanley Nelson, whose projects featured on the series include Freedom Riders and Jonestown: The Life and Death of People’s Temple, wrote on X, “I was shocked and saddened to learn earlier this week that GBH, a pioneering producer of public media in the U.S., has paused American Experience, the longest-running and most-watched historical documentary series on American television, and laid off its staff and leadership.”
He added that it was “highly distressing that public media would pause the production of such vital programming that serves the core of this mission. I stand in solidarity with American Experience’s dedicated staff and call on public media leadership to prioritize this essential series at such a crucial time in this nation’s history. We all have a responsibility to preserve the ongoing story of the U.S., especially at a time when freedom of expression is so threatened.”
The series has won 30 Emmys and 19 Peabody awards.
One of the signature events on PBS this fall will be Ken Burns’ The American Revolution, a six-part, 12-hour series produced separately from American Experience. He has called the federal funding cuts “short sighted.” He said that about 20% of his budgets come from the CPB and “we’ll have to make it up. I’m confident that with the extra work, it will happen.”
He said, “But it’s those projects at the national level that might get 50 or 60, maybe even 75% of their funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. They just won’t be able to be made, and so there will be less representation by all the different kinds of filmmakers. People coming up will have an impossible time getting started.”
The post As U.S. Prepares For 250th Celebrations, GBH’s ‘American Experience’ To Pause New Episodes Amid Public Media Federal Funding Cuts appeared first on Deadline.
