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Plays in Shorts Program: Final Press
Saturday, June 13
1:30 PM - 3:15 PM

Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company

641 D St NW, Washington, DC 20004

for all screenings

Seized

Director

Sharon Liese

Executive Producers

George R. Hearst III, Megan Gelstein, Jonathan Logan, Debbie L. McLeod, Jonathan Murray, Harvey Reese, Jenny Raskin, Ruth Ann Harnisch, Ann Baum, Steven Rosenthal, Trudy Jacobson

Co-Executive Producers

Jon Niccum, Margaret Munzer Loeb, Barbara Dobkin, Eric Dobkin, Marni E. J. Grossman

Producers

Sharon Liese, Sasha Alpert, Paul Matyasovsky

Associate Producer

Alexandra Siambekos

Editor

Derek Boonstra

Co-Editor

Derek Boonstra

Cinematographer

Jackson Montemayor

Contact

Josh Braun, Submarine Entertainment

A gripping, stranger-than-fiction investigative thriller, SEIZED plunges audiences inside the troubling police raid on the Marion County Record. What begins as a shocking small-town incident quickly spirals into a national story, exposing how corruption, politics, and decades-long tensions turned a quiet Kansas community into a battleground over the First and Fourth Amendments. The film unfolds in real time through police body-cam and surveillance footage, revealing the chaos of the raid, the bombshells that followed, and the devastating personal toll on the newsroom, including the tragic death of its 98-year-old co-owner.

Director Sharon Liese allows the story to unfold with nuance, surprise, eccentric characters, and moments of humor. By letting each voice speak for itself, she crafts a rare documentary in which sympathies shift moment to moment, revealing how truth, ego, and fear collide in real time. Blending the juicy intrigue of a classic muckraking narrative with a clear-eyed exploration of power, politics, and the fragility of a free press, SEIZED transforms a headline-grabbing event into a deeply human story that is urgent, unsettling, and impossible to ignore.

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Sharon Liese

Director, Seized

Sharon Liese is an Emmy Award–winning director passionate about telling stories that move people. Her film THE FLAGMAKERS (NatGeo, Disney+) won the Emmy for Outstanding Short Documentary (2023) and was Oscar-shortlisted. Her short documentary PARKER premiered at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival and is distributed by The New Yorker. Her HBO feature documentary TRANSHOOD won the Audience Award at AFI. Her film THE GNOMIST (CNN Films) has received more than 15 awards. Sharon also created and executive produced Pink Collar Crimes (CBS), High School Confidential (WeTV), and many other projects for premium networks and streamers.

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