In the News: The Latest on ITVS Programs

Film Series to Empower Women 
Independent Television Service, producers of Emmy-award winning documentaries for public television, has teamed up with the Chicago Foundation for Women, Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Chicago Public Media to present the Women’s Empowerment Summer Film Series — a free series of screenings highlighting issues facing women in the U.S. and around the world. A 45-minute discussion with representatives from local organizations serving women and girls will follow each screening.

Littlefeather recounts price of native activism 
Sacheen Littlefeather, the actor who stood in for Marlon Brando at the 1973 Oscars, says she paid a high price for her criticism of Hollywood portrayals of First Nations people. Littlefeather, now 63, said that act of advocacy cut her acting career short and put her life at risk. She was speaking to TV critics in a promotion for Reel Injun: On the Trail of the Hollywood Indian, a Canadian-made documentary that is to air on PBS's Independent Lens in November. Read more >>>

Rosie O'Donnell returns to daytime TV on Oprah's net 
Oprah Winfrey announces that Rosie O'Donnell is returning to daytime TV in a talk show (gak) on The Oprah Winfrey Network, in the middle of PBS's day at Summer TV Press Tour 2010 when, if she'd waited until the next morning, she could have announced it during Discovery's day at the tour -- Discovery being Oprah's partner in OWN. So instead of listening to Benazir Bhutto's cousin Mahin Hemmat, and Pakistan's ambassador to the United States Husain Haqqani talk about a new PBS Independent Lens project, Bhutto, they were madly typing on their laptops about how the sometimes polarizing Rosie… Read more >>>

Brando’s 1973 Oscar Stand-in Recounts Fallout 
acheen Littlefeather says she paid a price when she decried Hollywood's stereotyped portrayal of American Indians at the 1973 Oscars… She spoke Thursday during a presentation to TV critics on "Reel Injun: On the Trail of the Hollywood Indian," a documentary airing in November on the "Independent Lens" series. Read more >>>