Downtown Community Television Center (DCTV)

Biography

Since its inception in 1972, DCTV has been at the forefront of the independent social-issue documentary movement, and has contributed to several landmarks of that genre. Founded by Jon Alpert and Keiko Tsuno in New York's Chinatown as a community-based organization, DCTV offers video training, equipment and social-issue programming. DCTV's forceful investigative reporting, presented in Emmy Award-winning documentaries, represents compelling advocacy journalism.

In 1974, DCTV made history as the first American television crew to be invited to Cuba since the 1959 revolution. The resulting Cuba: The People (1974) was the first half-inch color videotape to be shown nationally on public television, and one of the first independent video documentaries to be broadcast. As the first American journalists allowed into Vietnam after the U.S. withdrawal, DCTV continued to break new ground with Vietnam: Picking Up the Pieces(1978), which examined the aftermath of American involvement in the war.

Employing a direct interview approach and a signature "up-close" reporting strategy that focuses on the voices of ordinary people, DCTV has produced an extensive body of work that addresses inequality and injustice in America. Jon Alpert has also produced numerous programs as a correspondent for NBC Nightly News and the Today show. DCTV's initial success in broadcasting its work helped open television to other independent documentarians. DCTV is recognized as among the foremost producers of social-issue documentaries and advocacy journalism.