“An Act of Worship” on PBS POV
An Act of Worship made its broadcast premiere on the 35th season of PBS’ POV program on October 17, 2022. The entire team is thrilled to have our film associated with this long running institution of documentary filmmaking, where it has been able to reach a vast and diverse viewership.
POV’s press release reads:
New York, N.Y. — June 10, 2022 — POV, the critically acclaimed PBS documentary series, announced today the acquisition of An Act of Worship as part of its 35th season. The film by Pakistani-American director Nausheen Dadabhoy and produced by DuPont-Crichton Award-winner Heba Elorbany, Emmy® Award-winner Kristi Jacobson, and Emmy-nominated Sofian Khan is a counter-narrative of the last 30 years of Muslim life in America. An Act of Worshipmade its world premiere June 9th at the 2022 Tribeca Festival and will make its national broadcast premiere on Monday, October 17, 2022 on POV.
In An Act of Worship, a diverse range of Muslim Americans recount the past 30 years of pivotal moments in U.S. history and policy from their own perspectives. The film weaves together observational footage of activists who came of age after 9/11, community-sourced home videos, and evocative recollections from individuals impacted by incidents of Islamophobia. Due to the filmmaking team’s first-hand knowledge and intimate access to the Muslim community, Dadabhoy is able to marry various voices of the account, which previously had been shaped largely by outsiders.
American Documentary | POV Executive Director Erika Dilday said: “We’re very pleased to include An Act of Worship in our Season 35 slate. This film dispels the idea of Muslim Americans as a monolith and contextualizes each specific story and voice in the mosaic that is America.”
“Through intimate home video archival and a tapestry of community voices that narrate the film, we hope to regain authorship of our community’s story. It’s a way to replace images of violence so that our community can see itself through its own gaze. Our partnership with POV is so meaningful, as it expands our film’s reach as we’d always hoped – reaching our community, through impact and engagement screenings, and via broadcast, the private, quotidian, and communal moments that are rarely portrayed in stories about Muslim Americans will be televised into homes across the United States” said An Act of Worship filmmaker Nausheen Dadabhoy.
The An Act of Worship deal was negotiated by Chris White and Erika Dilday for American Documentary | POV and Nausheen Dadabhoy, Heba Elorbany, Kristi Jacobson, and Sofian Khan for the filmmaking team.
In addition to An Act of Worship screenings during the festival, Tribeca Festival and The Blackhouse Foundation, with co-hosts Firelight Media, Brown Girls Doc Mafia, and Pillars are holding a special panel event featuring An Act of Worship. Panelists will discuss the importance of storytellers from marginalized communities, providing perspectives through lived experience and disrupting harmful narratives that impact their communities.
POV episodes premiere Monday nights and are available for streaming concurrent with broadcast on all station-branded PBS platforms, including PBS.org, and the PBS Video app, available on iOS, Android, Roku streaming devices, Apple TV, Android TV, Amazon Fire TV, Samsung Smart TV, Chromecast and VIZIO. For more information about PBS Passport, visit the PBS Passport FAQ website. In addition to standard closed captioning, POV, in partnership with audio description service DiCapta, provides real time audio interpretations for audiences with sensory disabilities.
An Act of Worship is a co-presentation of the Center for Asian American Media (CAAM), and American Documentary | POV, directed by Nausheen Dadabhoy and produced by Heba Elorbany, Kristi Jacobson and Sofian Khan. The Executive Producers for American Documentary | POV are Erika Dilday and Chris White.
