Poets & Writers Theater

In this PBS Independent Lens documentary codirected by Dawn Logsdon, who also narrates, and Lucie Faulknor, the history of public libraries is uncovered, from the quiet revolutionaries who opened these doors to all, to today’s librarians who service the public in an age of closures and book bans. “Libraries are not just about books. They’re about people, and they’re about stories.”

In this interview for The Thread documentary series, Pulitzer Prize–winning author Viet Thanh Nguyen talks about his childhood experiences as a refugee and overcoming trauma, his parents’ complicated reaction to his writing career, and how storytelling and writing changed his life from an early age. Read about Nguyen’s essay collection To Save and Destroy: Writing as an Other (Belknap Press, 2025) in our Best Books series.

Watch the trailer for After: Poetry Destroys Silence, a cinematic performance film directed by Richard Kroehling and starring Cornelius Eady, Edward Hirsh, Melissa Leo, Géza Röhrig, and a cast of celebrated award-winning poets who respond to the Holocaust and talk about the importance and necessity for poetry in a world that still grapples with genocide.

“I remember what’s important and I make up the rest. That’s what storytelling is all about.” This HBO Original documentary takes a look at the life of legendary poet and activist Nikki Giovanni. The award-winning film is directed and written by Joe Brewster and Michèle Stephenson, and includes readings by executive producer Taraji P. Henson.

“He’s been such a mirror for pop culture, but now he’s his own pop culture.” In this trailer for King on Screen, a documentary about the many film and television adaptations of Stephen King’s stories and novels, directors and screenwriters discuss what makes King the master of horror.

“The things I discovered about writing were so important to me; it was the notion that you could write and find out what you really believed in.” Amy Tan speaks about her creative process in this video from PBS and American Masters previewing her documentary Amy Tan: Unintended Memoir directed by James Redford.

“This is where our story as Black Americans begins.” Watch the trailer for The 1619 Project, a six-part Hulu docuseries adaptation of the book of the same name hosted by Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist and author Nikole Hannah-Jones.

“He does the work. I do the cleanup, and we fight.” Turn Every Page: The Adventures of Robert Caro and Robert Gottlieb is a documentary directed by Lizzie Gottlieb exploring the remarkable fifty-year relationship between Pulitzer Prize–winning author Robert Caro and his longtime editor Robert Gottlieb, and the art of editing.

“What does it mean to write something urgent right now?” Don’t Be Nice is a 2018 documentary directed by Max Powers that follows a group of poets from the Bowery Poetry Club in New York City’s East Village who grapple with the political climate punctuated by the Black Lives Matter and #MeToo movements as they prepare for the National Poetry Slam championship during the summer of 2016.

“Writing, of course, is a substitute for the life I cannot live, am unable to live.” Loving Highsmith, a documentary directed by Eva Vitija, offers an intimate look at the life and work of Patricia Highsmith through her personal notes and diaries, as well as interviews with those who knew her.

“I wanted to tell people how I became this woman with razor blades between her teeth.” BaddDDD Sonia Sanchez, directed by Barbara Attie, Janet Goldwater, and Sabrina Schmidt Gordon, chronicles the life and work of poet and political activist Sonia Sanchez, including her emergence as a seminal figure in the Black Arts Movement, her tireless political activism, and a poetry career so great Maya Angelou called her “a lion in literature’s forest.” Sanchez is the recipient of the 2022 Jackson Poetry Prize.

“This is not a work of history. It is a report full of holes,” reads the late C. D. Wright from her book One With Others: [a little book of her days] (Copper Canyon Press, 2010) in this 2015 recording of an event at the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University.

“Every community on earth should wish they had a Zora Hurston.” In this short 2008 New York Times documentary by Damien Cave and Diana Oliva Cave, locals of Eatonville, Florida discuss their relationship with renowned author Zora Neale Hurston and the impact she had in saving the town’s future.

“I was twenty-three when I first approached him about making this film. I became obsessed,” says director Robert B. Weide in this trailer for Kurt Vonnegut: Unstuck in Time, a documentary codirected by Don Argott that captures two decades of footage of the famed author and recounts an extraordinary friendship.

“This is a woman, whose great-great-grandmother was a slave from the West African Kingdom of Dahomey, now the Republic of Benin. A woman who went on to be one of the most celebrated artists of her lifetime,” narrates Janice Harrington in this mini-documentary “Lucille Clifton: A Poet’s Life and Legacy,” produced by BOA Editions and Hunger Media.

Directed by Academy Award winner Martin Scorsese, Pretend It’s a City features the return of sardonic writer and public speaker Fran Lebowitz in conversation with the director as she shares anecdotes about her early life and career in New York City in the 1970s. The Netflix series continues the partnership of the longtime friends, who worked together on the 2010 HBO documentary Public Speaking.

“A good bookseller absolutely is another kind of discoverer and thinker of history,” says Kevin Young in this trailer for The Booksellers. The documentary, directed by D. W. Young and executive produced by Parker Posey, explores the history, personalities, and business of bookselling in New York City.

“Ultimately I knew that words have power.” Timothy Greenfield-Sanders’s documentary about Toni Morrison is an exploration of the author’s life story, her values and challenges, and her creative work. The film includes engaging interviews with Morrison, as well as notable peers, colleagues, and admirers such as Hilton Als, Russell Banks, Angela Davis, Walter Mosley, Sonia Sanchez, and Oprah Winfrey.

“This poem is not a cry for help. This poem is not my broken pieces. And we are not done yet.” In this HBO documentary, a group of veterans and active-duty service members come together to write a collaborative poem and turn it into a stage performance. The film is directed by Sareen Hairabedian and coproduced by Jeffrey Wright and David Holbrooke.

“I’d like us not to be resigned but to be rebellious—I want to see science fiction step over the old walls and head right into the next wall and start to break it down too.” Worlds of Ursula K. Le Guin is a crowdfunded documentary directed by Arwen Curry, who was able to collaborate with the late author before her death. The film features interviews with Le Guin, as well as authors including Margaret Atwood, Michael Chabon, Neil Gaiman, and Theodora Goss.