2001 Science in Society Journalism Awards

Television

Elizabeth Arledge, Julia Cort, producers/writers

Robert Krulwich, correspondent

“Cracking the Code of Life”

NOVA/PBS

Description

It’s not easy to hold the attention of a television audience for a two-hour documentary — especially on the intimidating topic of molecular biology. In this year’s winning TV entry, NOVA’s “Cracking the Code of Life” producers Elizabeth Arledge and Julia Cort and correspondent Robert Krulwich presented the complex story of the sequencing of the human genome with accuracy, a noted inquisitiveness, and even humor. Judges particularly commended the producers for clearly elucidating the biological, cultural and social ramifications of this intricate endeavor. For those coming to this multifaceted topic with an incomplete grasp of the science and other complexities, it was a splendid primer on perhaps the most important science story of the year.

The two-year collaborative project between WGBH/Boston and Clear Blue Sky Productions began as a story of the race to sequence the human genome told in a pivotal year through the experiences of the people at the two main competing labs, Celera Genomics (a private company) and the Whitehead Institute at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the largest federally sponsored group, Arledge said. With extensive inside access, film crews recorded fresh reactions of key scientists as events unfolded. Usually, storytelling is uncovered after the fact. Even then, when the story was nearly finished editing, the scientific papers published in February 2001 revealed so much new and unexpected information (such as a reduced number of genes, the similarities in DNA between us and every other species) that the team rewrote, re-interviewed people, and found new visual materials.

Biographies

Elizabeth Arledge has been a documentary producer, writer, and director for over 20 years and has broad experience in developing, producing, directing, writing, reporting, and editing for national network, cable, and public television. She began her career at WCVB-TV in Boston where she was a founding producer of the award-winning longtime series “Chronicle.” After joining WGBH/Boston in 1982, Ms. Arledge produced a series of local half hour documentaries, including the winner of the Corporation for Public Television Local Broadcasting Award, "Two Intimate Journeys." This program was also awarded the American Women in Radio and Television Award.

From local programming Ms. Arledge moved to national production in 1983, as an associate producer and then producer on Frontline, where she produced, wrote, and directed 10 programs and received the California Trial Lawyers Award, the John Muir Medical Film Festival Award, and was nominated for a national Emmy for "The Death of Nancy Cruzan." For WNET/13 in New York, Ms. Arledge produced and wrote "Live Long and Prosper," which won the OWL Award. For CBS News she produced a series of documentaries and stories for "Public Eye with Bryant Gumbel." For NOVA, Ms. Arledge produced "Surviving AIDS" (1999) which was awarded the American Association for the Advancement of Science Excellence in Television Award, and was nominated for a Writers Guild Award. She is currently at work developing a six part series for NOVA on Childrens Hospital Boston. She lives in Cambridge, Mass. with her 12-year old daughter.

Julia Cort

Julia Cort started making films over 20 years ago as a student at Harvard, when science was the last thing on her mind. Her thesis film, “A Fine Romance,” an examination of her parents’ complicated marriage, won the New England Film and Video Festival Student Film Award. During the 1980’s, she spent several years in New York and Los Angeles, paying dues on more than twenty feature films and television productions, including “Imagine: John Lennon,” “Tales from the Darkside,” and “Dirty Dancing.” After returning to Boston and her documentary roots, Ms. Cort joined the WGBH Science Unit, which produces NOVA. Hired in 1991 as an associate producer, she became a staff producer/writer six years ago. “Cracking the Code of Life” is one of seventeen NOVA programs she’s worked on. Others include “Runaway Universe,” “The Vikings,” and the popular “Secrets of Lost Empires” series on ancient technology. She received the 1998 AAAS Science Journalism Award for the NOVA “Warnings from the Ice,” a sobering look at Antarctica’s unstable ice sheets. In 1999, Ms. Cort was selected to attend the first annual "Genes & Cells Boot Camp," a Knight Science Journalism Mini-Fellowship at MIT. Insights from this intensive weeklong course on genetics were put to good use in “Cracking the Code of Life.” Ms. Cort’s most recent project at NOVA is “Life’s Greatest Miracle,” a new HDTV look inside-the-body at human reproduction, photographed by Swedish legend Lennart Nilsson, the mastermind behind NOVA’s classic film “Miracle of Life.” She lives in Milton, MA with her husband, archeologist Mark Lehner, and their two young children.

Robert Krulwich

Robert Krulwich has explained arbitrage by wearing Groucho glasses, illustrated the Texaco-Pennzoil battle with Barbie and Ken dolls, and (to his eternal regret) demonstrated a video game by driving around in a car with Connie Chung. In short, Krulwich is "the most inventive network reporter in television" (TV Guide), a beloved correspondent who for years has made economics, technology, and science funny, entertaining and comprehensible.

A 1974 Columbia Law School graduate, Krulwich quit the profession after only two months to become Washington bureau chief for Pacifica Radio. From there, he went on the air at National Public Radio, perfecting his unique, quirky style by, among other things, recording an opera called "Rato Interesso" to explain interest rates. After hosting the acclaimed PBS-TV arts series, “The Edge,” he joined CBS This Morning in 1984. Now at ABC News, he appears regularly on Nightline and hosted the network’s 1999 primetime summer series, “Brave New World.” His work on the PBS-TV series, Frontline, has won him Emmy, George Polk and DuPont awards for programs on subjects from campaign finance reform to the internet. Once a year, with friends Jane Curtin, Buck Henry and Tony Hendra, he hosts a semi-fictional year-in-review called Backfire. In 1995, the group performed at the White House at the invitation of President and Mrs. Clinton.

Krulwich believes that viewers can grasp difficult concepts better from simple, everyday objects — refrigerator magnets, say, or even hand puppets — than from high-tech computer graphics. “TV is best,” he says, “when something explodes, when somebody cries, when somebody’s angry or sad, or very happy. When there’s love in the air, or tragedy, you can say, ‘look at this.’“ In his lectures and personal appearances, Robert Krulwich is a show — and an education — all by himself.

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