They couldn’t kill their bosses, so they did the next best thing — they organized.
When Dolly Parton sang “9 to 5,” she was doing more than just shining a light on the fate of American working women. Parton was singing the true story of a movement that started with 9to5, a group of Boston secretaries in the early 1970s. Their goals were simple—better pay, more advancement opportunities and an end to sexual harassment—but their unconventional approach attracted the press and shamed their bosses into change. Featuring interviews with 9to5’s founders, as well as actor and activist Jane Fonda, 9to5: The Story of a Movement is the previously untold story of the fight that inspired a hit and changed the American workplace. MORE
The Filmmakers
Ohio-based Julia Reichert is a four time Academy Award nominee and Oscar winner for her documentary work. Julia’s student film at Antioch College, Growing Up Female was the first feature documentary of the modern Women’s Movement. It was selected for the National Film Registry. Her films Union Maids and Seeing Red: Stories of American Communists, (with Jim Klein) were screened worldwide, nominated for Academy Awards for Best Feature Documentary, as was The Last Truck, as a Short. Her film A Lion in the House (made with Steven Bognar) premiered at Sundance, screened nationally on PBS, won the Primetime Emmy for Exceptional Merit in Nonfiction Filmmaking. Her film, The Last Truck (with Bognar) premiered on HBO, and the Telluride Film Festival. Reichert and Bognar won the 2020 Academy Award for Best Documentary for American Factory. Julia is co-founder of New Day Films, the independent film distribution co-op. She is author of “Doing It Yourself,” the first book on self-distribution in independent film. Julia has been drawn to focus on class, gender and race in her work. She is a mom and a grandma.
Steven Bognar is an Oscar and Emmy award winning documentary filmmaker based in Ohio. With his partner Julia Reichert, he has directed and produced American Factory, The Last Truck, and A Lion in the House. Their films have screened at top film festivals, and on HBO, PBS and Netflix. Bognar’s first feature documentary, Personal Belongings, which he produced, directed & edited, premiered at the 1996 Sundance Film Festival, and screened that year at SXSW, IDFA and on P.O.V. His short films include Last Reel (Telluride Film Festival premiere), Foundry Night Shift (True/False Film Festival premiere), No Guns for Christmas (New York Times Op-Doc, with Reichert) and Picture Day (Sundance Film Festival premiere). LESS
