Tia Lessin is an American documentary filmmaker.^[1] Lessin has produced and directed documentaries and earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Documentary and the Sundance Grand Jury Prize for Documentary.

She co-directed the film The Janes which had its premiere at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival and is the director and producer, with Carl Deal, of Trouble the Water and Citizen Koch. She directed Behind the Labels and produced several of Michael Moore's films including Fahrenheit 9/11, Where to Invade Next and Fahrenheit 11/9.

Career

Tia Lessin is producer and director, together with Carl Deal, of the Academy Award-nominated feature documentary Trouble the Water, winner of the Gotham Independent Film Award and the Sundance Film Festival’s Grand Jury Prize for best documentary. Lessin was a co-producer of Michael Moore's Where to Invade Next, Capitalism: A Love Story, Fahrenheit 9/11, winner of the Palme d'Or, and the supervising producer of Academy Award-winning Bowling for Columbine.

Lessin received the Sidney Hillman Prize for Broadcast Journalism for her documentary Behind the Labels. She line produced Martin Scorsese's No Direction Home: Bob Dylan and was consulting producer for his Living in the Material World: George Harrison. She began her career as associate producer of Charles Guggenheim's Oscar-nominated short film Shadows of Hate.

In television, Lessin's work as producer of the series The Awful Truth earned her two Emmy Award nominations and one arrest.^{[citation needed]}

Lessin is a Sundance Institute Fellow, an Open Society Institute Katrina Media Fellow, a Creative Capital grantee and was awarded the Women of Worth "Vision" Award by L’Oréal Paris and Women in Film.

On February 6, 2023, Tia Lessin and co director Emma Pildes won the Alfred I. duPont-Columbia Award’s Silver Baton for their 2022 HBO documentary 'The Janes'. The Alfred I. duPont–Columbia University Awards honor outstanding public service audio and video reporting in television, radio and digital journalism.

Awards and recognitions

• Winner, Alfred I. duPont-Columbia Awards, 2023
• Academy Award nominee, Best Documentary Feature, 2008
• Winner, Grand Jury Prize, Sundance Film Festival
• Winner, Grand Jury Prize, Full Frame Film Festival
• Winner, Gotham Independent Film Award
• Emmy Award nominee, producer of Outstanding Informational program: long form, 2010
• Emmy Award nominee, Outstanding Individual Achievement in a Craft: Research, 2010
• Nominee, Producers Guild of America Award, best non fiction producer 2008
• Nominee, NAACP Image Award, 2008
• Council On Foundations Henry Hampton Award for Excellence In Film And Digital Media, 2009
• Harry Chapin Media Award for Film, 2009
• Winner, Sidney Hillman Prize for Broadcast Journalism
• Women of Worth Vision Award by L'Oréal Paris and Women in Film.^[2]
• Emmy Award Nominee, producer of Outstanding Non-Fiction Series, 2000–2001
• Emmy Award Nominee, producer of Outstanding Non-Fiction Series, 1998–1999
• Creative Capital grantee
• Sundance Institute Fellow
• Open Society Institute Katrina Media Fellow

Filmography

Feature films and documentaries

• The Janes (2022), director
• Fahrenheit 11/9 (2018), executive producer
• Where to Invade Next (2016), producer
• Citizen Koch (2013), director & producer
• Living in the Material World: George Harrison (2011), co-executive producer
• Capitalism: A Love Story (2009), co-producer
• Trouble the Water (2008), director & producer
• No Direction Home: Bob Dylan (2005), line producer
• Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004), producer
• Bowling for Columbine (2002), supervising producer
• Behind the Labels (2002), producer & director
• The Big One (1997), coordinating producer
• Shadows of Hate (1995), associate producer

Television

• The Awful Truth (1999, 2000), producer
• TV Nation: Volume One & Two (1997), associate producer