2025 Jury
The Henry Awards for Public Interest Documentary Grand Prize Winner, Finalists, and Honorable Mentions were selected from the pool of Semi-Finalist films by a panel of five expert jurors. Sara Archambault, the Program Director of the Documentary Film in the Public Interest (DFPI) Initiative chaired the jury meetings. Jurors recused themselves from voting on nominated projects for which there was a conflict of interest, with regard to meaningful or personal affiliation to the creation of the film.
Ra’anan Alexandrowicz
Ra’anan Alexandrowicz is a director and editor. His most recent film, THE VIEWING BOOTH, premiered at the 2020 Berlin Film Festival, won several international awards, and was named Rolling Stone magazine’s best documentary of 2021. Alexandrowicz’s documentary THE LAW IN THESE PARTS (2012) received the Grand Jury Award in the Sundance Film Festival’s World Cinema Competition, a Peabody Award, and numerous other prizes. His earlier documentaries, THE INNER TOUR (2002) and MARTIN (1999), were shown at the Berlin Film Festival’s Forum section and in MoMA’s New Directors/New Films. His films have been released theatrically in the U.S. and Europe, and have been broadcast by PBS, ARTE, BBC, among other channels. Ra’anan served several times as an editing advisor for the Sundance Documentary Fund. He has also been an editing advisor on CITIZENFOUR, WELCOME TO CHECHNYA, NIGHT IS NOT ETERNAL, and several other documentaries. He is a 2024 Center for Experimental Ethnography Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania, a 2024 MacDowell Residency Fellow, and a 2025 ConTrust Fellow at the Goethe University in Frankfurt.
MANDY CHANG
Mandy is an experienced documentary filmmaker, executive producer, and creative director. Her broad perspective of the field comes from having worked in many roles throughout her career—from award-winning producer/director and executive producer, to commissioner. She led the BBC’s flagship international documentary strand, Storyville, curating and overseeing a rich and diverse slate of feature documentaries over four years. She then went to Fremantle as their Global Head of Documentaries—to establish their documentary division, working on films like IT’S NEVER OVER: JEFF BUCKLEY, DEVO, and WHATEVER IT TAKES. She has commissioned and executive-produced acclaimed feature docs and series around the globe, like ONE CHILD NATION, THE MOLE: INFILTRATING NORTH KOREA, WELCOME TO CHECHNYA, and THE FOURTH ESTATE, to name a few, working with the world’s best filmmakers, and fostering new talent. Mandy is a fierce and committed advocate, mentor, curator, and spokesperson within the documentary field and currently works independently on her own slate of projects.
PETRA COSTA
For more than a decade Petra Costa has been telling stories in the crossroads between the personal and the political, trying to understand the brutally unequal society we live in, much focused in her home country, Brazil. Her latest documentary APOCALYPSE IN THE TROPICS premiered at the Venice Biennale in 2024 and won best documentary at the Havana and Montclair film festivals. Previously, she directed THE EDGE OF DEMOCRACY, which was nominated for an Academy Award and was listed by the New York Times as one of the best 10 films of 2019. It won the Peabody Award, Spirit Awards, and best director at DOC NYC. Her first feature, ELENA, was the most watched documentary in Brazil in 2013. ELENA premiered at IDFA and won many prizes such as best documentary at Havana Film Festival (2013), best film at DOCSDF, and was nominated for Best Cinematography at the 2014 Cinema Eye Honors. In 2015, Petra directed together with Lea Glob, OLMO AND THE SEAGULL, which won the young jury prize in Locarno Film Festival. She produced ECSTASY (2020) by Moara Passoni, she is the Associate Producer of BABENCO (2019) and the Executive Producer of BEBA (2021).
RON NIXON
Ron Nixon is the Director of the Associated Press Local Investigative Program. Previously, he served as Vice President for News, investigative, enterprise, and grants and partnerships. Nixon received the inaugural 2021 News Leader of the Year award from the News Leaders Association. He has overseen investigations that have won a number of awards including, the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service, a George Polk award, three News and Documentary Emmys, and a George Foster Peabody Award. He previously led AP’s global investigations team.
MICHÈLE STEPHENSON
Michèle Stephenson draws from her Caribbean roots and work as a social justice lawyer to transform non-fiction storytelling. Anchored in a Black radical tradition, she creates narratives of resistance and healing that push the boundaries of form; interweaving fiction, immersive, and experimental approaches in her work. Her films GOING TO MARS: THE NIKKI GIOVANNI PROJECT and BLACK GIRLS PLAY were Oscar-shortlisted, with GOING TO MARS winning the Sundance Grand Jury Prize and the prestigious Creative Arts Emmy for Exceptional Merit in Documentary Filmmaking. BLACK GIRLS PLAY received the Edward R. Murrow Award for Excellence in Video. Her feature, AMERICAN PROMISE, earned three Emmy nominations and won the Jury Prize at Sundance. STATELESS was nominated for a Canadian Academy Award for Best Feature Documentary. She also co-directed THE CHANGING SAME, a magical realist VR trilogy, premiered at Sundance New Frontier, won the Tribeca Grand Jury Prize for Best Immersive Narrative, and was Emmy-nominated for Outstanding Interactive Media. Stephenson is currently in post-production on TRUE NORTH, a hybrid doc on the Black Power movement in Canada. She is a Guggenheim and Creative Capital Artist.