For more information, contact Stephanie Ely, (937) 775-3232. 
September 12, 2007 Wright State professor and alumnus bring home an Emmy Award Wright State University’s award-winning motion picture program is celebrating this week with filmmakers Julia Reichert and Steven Bognar who received a Primetime Emmy Award for Exceptional Merit in Nonfiction Filmmaking for their film A Lion in the House.Reichert, Wright State professor of theatre arts/motion pictures, and Bognar, a 1986 graduate of Wright State’s motion pictures program, shared the award with Spike Lee for his film When The Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts. The awards were presented Saturday in Los Angeles’ Shrine Auditorium. “It’s the highest honor you can get for a TV documentary,” said Stuart Mc Dowell, professor and chair of Wright State’s Department of Theater Arts. “This is a real triumph for Julia and Steve, for our department, for the university and for those brave children in Cincinnati who have weathered the incredible travail of fighting cancer.” A Lion in the House follows the lives of five families dealing with the everyday realities of childhood cancer. Reichert and Bognar followed the progression of cancer in the lives of five children and their families over a nine-year period. The four-hour documentary was shown in two parts last June on PBS as part of the Independent Lens series. “I mentioned Wright State in our acceptance speech,” said Reichert. “People on campus have been so understanding about what I do and allowing me flexibility. That is so important in the arts and it makes for more valuable teachers. “We also want to honor and thank the people who had worked so hard with us, many of whom are Wright State alumni and graduates of the motion picture program—editors Jaime Meyers, Kevin Jones, Brent Huffman, Sarah Silver and Ann Rotolante; line producer and filmmaker Melissa Godoy; Karen Durgans, our outreach coordinator; and James Klein, Wright State professor of motion pictures. “Some of them are my former students, I’ve known them since they were in their twenties and now they are full time editors in L.A.,” said Reichert. “To be onstage at the Emmys with them is an honor and a fulfillment of dreams. “To receive this award and to be in the company of Spike Lee is quite thrilling,” said Reichert. “But what is more important to me is when I hear or get a letter from people who have been touched by the film, the nurses, the doctors, the young cancer survivors. This film is for them.” A two-hour special of the four-hour Creative Arts Primetime Emmys will be presented next Saturday at 8 p.m. on E!, Entertainment. 
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