Ralph Arlyck has produced and directed more than a dozen prize-winning, independent films, which have appeared on PBS, the BBC, Arte, screened at the White House, and have played festivals worldwide, including Sundance, New York, London, and Rotterdam. His documentary feature, Following Sean, played theatrically across the United States and on PBS and was nominated for two Emmy awards. Arlyck has also produced Current Events, an examination of the ways people do (or do not) respond to the stream of horrific events on the nightly news, and An Acquired Taste, a wry look at American culture’s obsession with success — considered a classic of independent cinema and personal filmmaking, and called by Vincent Canby in the New York Times, “…a delight…a funny, loving movie”.
Throughout his career, Arlyck has also played a key advocacy role for American independent producers, testifying twice in Congress and once before the Carnegie Commission on the role of independents in public television. He was centrally involved in legislation that first recognized independents as an important force within that system. He is a recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship and a Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship.