ABOUT DURRIN PRODUCTIONS, INC.
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Ginny Durrin, the president and owner of Durrin Productions, Inc., has received national and international recognition for her distinctive stylistic documentaries, including a nomination for an Academy Award for PROMISES TO KEEP about Mitch Snyder and the homeless that was shown on PBS.
Durrin Productions, Inc. is an award-winning 30 year old Washington, D.C. film and video company. For more than three decades the firm's production arm has created social issue media for broadcast and a wide variety of clients
Broadcast credits include HOMEGROWN: ISLAM IN PRISON, about radical Islam in our prisons, (Part of the PBS series, America at a Crossroads), POISONS AND PLAGUES for the Ted Turner PBS series, Avoiding Armageddon, GULLIVER’S TRAVELS and WALDEN, for the DISCOVERY/TLC Great Books Series, DAUGHTERS OF TIME on PBS, HARD WORK on PBS, and WORKER TO WORKER and CAN’T TAKE NO MORE on PBS.
Her current project is BOMBS IN OUR BACKYARD, about the deadly contamination of a prominent Washington DC neighborhood from buried WWI chemical weapons. She has been documenting the story in her neighborhood for over 16 years, and the show is now in post production.
Her independent films have appeared nationally in prime time on PBS, and have been broadcast on foreign outlets, including the BBC. Her films have been shown at the Edinburgh, Sydney, Melbourne, Shanghai, London, Leipzig, and Munich film festivals.
Ginny Durrin has traveled and filmed internationally in such diverse places as Kurdistan, Iraq, England, Ireland, Japan and Honduras. She began her career as a Peace Corps volunteer, serving in Bogota, Colombia as an educational television producer-director. She has a strong ability to establish a rapport with her subjects and to capture their stories in a personal and compelling way.
Awards include: a nomination for an Academy Award, an Emmy, four Blue Ribbons in the American Film and Video Festival, numerous CINE Golden Eagles, three First Prizes in the National Council on Family Relations Festival, the Woman of Vision Award from Women in Film and Video, and many others.
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VIRGINIA N. DURRIN
Producer/Director/Writer Academy Award Nominee owner of Durrin Productions, Inc., an award winning production and distribution company, located in the District of Columbia.
SELECTED SHOWS FOR BROADCAST:
HOMEGROWN: ISLAM IN PRISON: a one hour show on Islam in prison. PBS national primetime broadcast November, 2007.
AVOIDING ARMAGEDDON Poison and Plagues: A 90 minute show on chemical and biological weapons of mass destruction, produced and directed for Ted Turner Documentaries. Hosted by Walter Cronkite. Part of a series, Avoiding Armageddon. PBS national broadcast, April, 2003.
BOMBS IN OUR BACKYARD: Part historical, part sociological, part investigative. An affluent neighborhood discovers that it is the contaminated WWI birthplace of chemical warfare in the U.S. In production.
HEALTHCARE IN AMERICA: PBS Series. Segment on access to healthcare for Hedrick Smith Productions. Oct 2000.
STRESSBUSTERS: Twenty one minute spots on ways to combat stress. Produced for DISCOVERY HEALTH. 2000.
HUMAN GUINEA PIGS: HBO pilot. The story and history of human experimentation. 1999
RELIGION & ETHICS NEWSWEEKLY: PBS. “Highway to Heaven”, “Healing and Prayer”, “Wicca”, and “Day of the Dead”. 1998
WALDEN: A one-hour show produced for Discovery Communication’s “Great Books” series. Cronkite Ward, Executive Producers. 1997
GULLIVER'S TRAVELS: A one-hour show produced for Discovery Communication’s “Great Books" series. Cronkite Ward, Executive Producers 1996.
CITIZENS '96: WETA. One segment in an hour-and-a-half special for PBS stations on voters' concerns in the upcoming election year. 1996
CHORE WARS; IS YOUR TEENAGER NORMAL? MENOPAUSE; KIDS & SMOKING; TEENS & DEPRESSION: Whittle Communications' SRTV. Host Joan Lunden. 1992-1994
LABOR OF FREEDOM: PBS stations. A half-hour documentary produced in association with the AFL-CIO on labor union movements in Poland, The Philippines, and South Africa. 1992
WHEN THE BOUGH BREAKS: Central TV, London, England. U.S. Producer. About the global environment and our children’s' future. 1990
PROMISES TO KEEP: PBS prime time. ACADEMY AWARD NOMINEE, Best Documentary Feature. Narrated by Martin Sheen. A chronicle of Washington, D.C.'s homeless advocate Mitch Snyder's struggle to renovate a homeless shelter. Blue Ribbon, American Film and Video Festival; Emmy, Nat’l Academy of Television Arts and Sciences; 1st Place, Atlanta Film Fest. 1988
THE FORGOTTEN FRONTIER: WETA TV. An adaptation of a black and white silent film originally produced in 1930, about the delivery of health care to people in rural Kentucky by nurse-midwives. 1985
SOLIDARNOSC: European Television and USIA, CINE Golden Eagle. 1983
WORKER TO WORKER: PBS stations. A half-hour show about workers organizing for health and safety. Hosted by Ed Asner. Blue Ribbon, American Film Fest.; CINE Golden Eagle. 1982
www.youtube.com/watch?v=puRnHE1nNYE
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OTHER SELECTED PRODUCTIONS
REAL PSYCHIATRY features the lives of practicing psychiatrists. Produced for the American Psychiatric Association. 2004
Annual fundraising shows, produced for the Jewish Foundation for Group Homes, 2000-2009 www.jfgh.org/video1.asp
VNRs for the FTC, produced for Vanguard Communications, 2001 – 2002.
EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES AT YOUR SERVICE; For US Office of Education, 2001
WE ARE FAMILY: Life verite style for four young adults in a group home for the developmentally disabled. Produced for the Jewish Foundation for Group Homes. 2000
NO REAL WINNERS: SEXUAL HARASSMENT IN ACADEMIA: Features real people and their experiences and points of views on sexual harassment. 1995
JACOB JAVITS PROGRAM FOR GIFTED AND TALENTED CHILDREN: U.S. Office of Education. 1995
TOBACCO-FREE YOU & ME: Students at Sidwell Friends School analyze cigarette advertising aimed at children. CINE Golden Eagle; D.C. Film Fest. 1994
THIS IS YOUR LIFE DRUG-FREE: A half hour show for teens about the effects of drug use. 1999. Winner of CINE Golden Eagle.
MISSION POSSIBLE: An inside look at the FBI. 1993
DOUBLE DUTCH - DOUBLE JEOPARDY: An AIDS prevention video for children in fourth through sixth grades. CINE Golden Eagle; Honorable Mention, National Council on Family Relations. 1991
NINE MONTHS: Editorial Consultant for WETA-TV on a weekly show during the pregnancy and births of six women. WETA. 1990
FARMER-TO-FARMER: A half-hour recruitment film produced for the Peace Corps in Honduras. 1990 KEVIN'S STORY II: The sequel to the award-winning KEVIN'S STORY - the classic film on drinking and driving. 1988
'TIL DEATH DO US PART: A drama about HIV, drug use, and teens. Prized Pieces, Nat’l Black Programming Consortium; CINE Golden Eagle; Selected Film for Young Adults, ALA. 1988
THREE SCHOOLS: DRUG-FREE: Features three principals and how they created drug-free schools. Finalist, American Film Festival. 1987
THE AIDS MOVIE: A half-hour program acclaimed as the best film on AIDS prevention for young adults. CINE Golden Eagle; 1st Place, Nat’l Council on Family Relations; Finalist, Amer. Film Fest.; Nominee, Selected Films for Young Adults, ALA. 1986
KEVIN'S STORY: Kevin, 17, speaks to other students about his drinking and driving crash that killed another teen. First Prize for Social Issues & Addiction, Nat’l Council on Family Relations; CINE Golden Eagle. Honorable Mention, Amer. Film Fest. 1983
REPORT FROM BEIRUT: SUMMER 1982: Red Ribbon, Amer. Film Fest.; Silver Dove, Leipzig Int.'l Film Fest. 1983
NAN'S CLASS: Blue Ribbon, Amer. Film Fest. Third Annual Washington Film Festival. 1978
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Past Board Member, CINE
Woman of Vision Award for Creativity, Women in Film & Video, 1994
Member The Cosmos Club,
Member and Founding President, 1979, Women In Film & Video, Washington, DC
Association for Independent Video and Film makers
Board Member, Forum for the Psychoanalytic Study of Film. Present
Advisory Board, CINE. 1987-1989
Washington, DC. 1979
Past Executive Board Member, Washington, DC Film & Video Council
Past Executive Board Member, Wider Opportunities for Women.
Past Steering Committee Member, NEW DAY FILMS, film cooperative.
Independent Filmmaker Grantee, American Film Institute. 1979
Elliott Black Award, American Ethical Union. 1989
Grantee, Fund for Investigative Journalism. 1984
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- Bachelor of Arts in Communications and Public Policy, University of California, Berkeley, California.
- Peace Corps Volunteer, Bogota, Colombia. Producer-Director for an educational TV project.
- Sailed around the world for one year on a 138' Barquentine, the Yacht Verona.
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