Getting Ahead Production Team
About Tavis Smiley
From his celebrated conversations with world figures to his work to inspire the next generation of leaders, Tavis Smiley — broadcaster, author, publisher, advocate, and philanthropist — has emerged as an outstanding voice for change. Smiley is currently the host of the late-night television talk show Tavis Smiley on PBS, as well as The Tavis Smiley Show from Public Radio International (PRI).
Smiley has written 21 books. His memoir, What I Know for Sure: My Story of Growing Up in America, became a New York Times Bestseller, and the book he edited, Covenant with Black America, became the first nonfiction book by a Black-owned publisher to reach #1 on The New York Times Bestseller’s list.
In the New York Times Bestseller, The Rich and the Rest of Us: A Poverty Manifesto, Smiley and his co-author Dr. Cornel West challenge all Americans to re-examine their assumptions about poverty in America — what it really is and how to eradicate it.
Smiley’s book, My Journey With Maya, is being adapted as a stage play by Tony-winning director Kenny Leon. The book chronicles his almost thirty-year friendship with the iconic poet, Maya Angelou. Smiley’s 2014 New York Times Bestseller, Death of a King: The Real Story of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Final Year, and his most recent text, Before You Judge Me: The Triumph and Tragedy of Michael Jackson’s Last Days, are both being developed as television event series with Emmy-winner J.J. Abrams and Smiley as co-producers, in partnership with Warner Brothers.
The nonprofit Tavis Smiley Foundation is in the midst of a $3 million four-year campaign called ENDING POVERTY: America’s Silent Spaces to alleviate endemic poverty in America.
TIME magazine has cited Smiley as one of “The World’s 100 Most Influential People,” and Mr. Smiley has been honored with a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
About Jacoba Atlas
Jacoba Atlas is an Emmy winning writer and producer, with extensive experience as a broadcast executive at PBS, NBC News, Turner Broadcasting and CNN. Her most recent documentary, “Getting Ahead” which deals with the real life ramifications of those benefiting from and implementing minimum wage increases, marks the seventh time she has collaborated with Tavis Smiley on documentaries for PBS. Previous documentaries include “Too Important to Fail,” and “Education Under Arrest” as well a profile of Los Angeles Philharmonic conductor, Gustavo Dudamel and “A Call to Conscience” which deconstructed Martin Luther King Jr.’s pivotal anti-Vietnam War speech.
Previous work includes the Emmy and Peabody award winning “Suvivors of the Holocaust” with executive producer, Steven Spielberg, the Emmy nominated documentary, “Dying to Tell the Story” about journalists in war-zones, and “The Coming Plague” a six part series based on the Pulitzer Prize winning non-fiction book about infectious diseases and their impact on society. She was also the creator, writer and executive producer of the landmark, Emmy nominated series, “A Century of Women”; the archive for “A Century of Women” is now in the Schlesinger Library at Harvard University.