Stewarding Truth With Oscar-Winner Freida Lee Mock
by Arabella DeLucco
"Please welcome Oscar and Emmy Award-winning documentary filmmaker Freida Lee Mock," I said to the audience at the Uptown Theater in Napa Valley, Calif.
It was November 15, 2019. As an emcee of the Uptown Theater for the Ninth Annual Napa Valley Film Festival, I got the privilege to introduce and interview filmmakers and cast members screening their movies.
Freida seemed to glide across the stage with light and vibrant energy. She thanked the crowd and talked briefly about her documentary, Ruth: Justice Ginsburg in Her Own Words.
A few weeks after the Napa Valley Film Festival, Freida received a career achievement award from the 35th Annual International Documentary Association Awards (IDAA). This time, Academy, Tony and Emmy Award Winner, James Moll, introduced her.
Freida Lee Mock and James Moll at the 35th Annual International Documentary Association Awards (IDAA)
"[Freida] is the daughter of first-generation Chinese immigrants," James said. "When she earned a scholarship to UC Berkeley, her father was so excited. He said, 'You're gonna be a doctor!'"
Freida Lee Mock and James Moll at the 35th Annual International Documentary Association Awards (IDAA)
"Instead, she became a documentarian, a doctor of our 'body politic' you might say. . . examining who we are and what we're made of. . ."
James called Freida "a premiere cinematic portrait-artist" with three decades of "profiling Maya Lin, Tony Kushner, Anita Hill, along with so many others who reflect their times in unique and illuminating ways."
Not only is Freida an activist through her storytelling, but she's also a behind-the-scenes leader taking charge in matters of diversity and truth advocacy. She served six years as chair of the Directors Guild Documentary Awards Committee and as the first governor of the documentary branch at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Science. Freida has five Oscar nominations, winning an Academy Award for Maya Lin: A Strong, Clear Vision, and two Primetime Emmys.
If you watch any of Freida's work, you'll see why she's deserving of these trophies and accolades. Her work is so deeply rooted in the truth. From those roots grow up to a solid trunk of a story from which branches bear fruits of knowledge -- much-needed nourishment in our gaslighted world.
"Given this vacuum in moral leadership, I think we documentary storytellers and supporters need to seize the moment, support each other, and get our BOLD and boisterous documentaries out there now and quickly. As stewards of the truth, truly, the price of freedom is our vigilance and determination," Freida said in her acceptance speech at the IDA Awards.
After the Napa Valley Film Festival, Freida and I continued to chat over email. When I told her I would be at the Sundance Film Festival for the first time in January 2020, she graciously connected me to events and people -- particularly with the Asian American film community, including the Center for Asian Americans Media (CAAM).
Right now, as we share the impact of this global pandemic, it is more important than ever to be stewards of truth through our own storytelling, whatever mode or medium we may use. We must continue relating to each other as diverse, globally-connected people.