Paul Wagner

Over the course of two centuries, seven million men, women and children abandoned their homeland for America's shores. In just one horrifying decade, two million left to escape a famine that left another million dead. This is the moving chronicle of the Irish immigrant experience.

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Absolutely Irish brings together the brightest stars of traditional Irish music for a once-in-a-lifetime concert that will leave folk music fans stunned by the virtuoso performances. Filmed live at the intimate Irish Arts Center in New York City's famed Hell's Kitchen neighborhood, Irish music impresario Mick Moloney presents three generation of brilliant musicians. They display their mastery on favorite songs and traditional tunes, and rock the hall with their passionate performances. With special guest appearances by two living legends – flute player Mike Rafferty and Irish dancer Jo McNamara – and an inspiring rendition of Leaving Liverpool performed by the entire ensemble, Absolutely Irish shocases the best talent on the Irish music scene today.

A look at some of the last stone carvers working in the United States, those completing the sculptures adorning the Washington National Cathedral. They discuss their craft and the cultural forces which helped define it, as well as the fading use of stone ornamentation in architecture and the history of stone carving, and they tour the cathedral to point out the history behind some of the work.

Follows three young Tibetans faced with moral dilemmas: a rising pop star asked by her Chinese official boyfriend to sing pro-government songs; her brother, an embittered drunk; and their cousin, a Buddhist nun savagely beaten after shouting anti-Chinese slogans.

A documentary exploring the life and art of the most important woman artist of the 20th century, Georgia O'Keeffe, who became famous for her paintings of flowers and emerged as an iconic role model for women.

From foaling barn to finish line, Thoroughbred follows a year in the life of this storied horse, showcasing the beauty of the breed, revealing the people whose lives revolve around the racing industry, and exploring the history and traditions of the Thoroughbred world.

An examination of how the shared obsession with short-term profits between corporations and Wall Street is negatively impacting the foundations of American capitalism.

A look into the four athletes from the University of Kentucky who broke the color line in the South Eastern Conference in the 1960s.

Unable or unwilling to conform to the rigid atmosphere of Washington and Lee College as a freshman, Ed bailed out after a brief stint there to attend—and graduate from—Miami of Ohio. After graduate work at UK, he left for the Left Coast, and it suited him just fine. The first stop was a writing instructorship at Oregon State, then enrollment into the Stanford Writing Program, a move shared by Jim, Wendell, and Gurney. There he cultivated, among other things, relationships with Larry McMurtry, Robert Stone, and—most importantly—Ken Kesey. Ed didn’t just experience the 1960s; he wallowed in them. Also, a bonus interview from 1996 program, Signature Live.

This documentary recounts the struggle of the Pullman sleeping car porters to form the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, the first Black trade union in the United States. Through archival materials and interviews with retired porters, the film reveals the discrimination behind their famed “miles of smiles” service and the long fight for recognition and dignity.

Explore the creation and the re-creation of the Blue Ridge Railroad Tunnel in Virginia. Located at Rockfish Gap, 25 miles west of Charlottesville, the tunnel was designed by Claudius Crozet and built by Irish immigrants in the 1850s. When completed in 1858, at nearly a mile long, it was the longest railroad tunnel in America. It was reopened as a historic site in November of 2020.

Academy award winning filmmaker Paul Wagner and folklorist Steve Zeitlin produced this 1983 oral history of the old-time travelling medicine show performers, with a recreated medicine show staged in a small North Carolina town.

Long before the advent of hip-hop as a multi-million dollar industry, African Americans were rapping and rhyming in the street, in their neighborhoods, and on the fish market docks in Washington DC. In this film, Lincoln Rorie and Jerry Williams use traditional rhymes--and make up a few new ones--to entertain their customers, sell fish, and make money. Lincoln, from D.C., was hired by Captain White’s fish market boat in 1973, and inspired Jerry, from a fishing family on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, to use rhyme to sell. It's a remarkable story about a creative tradition in an occupational setting, and about how the expressive spirit takes hold in everyday life.