ACADEMY AWARD® NOMINEE AND EMMY® WINNER RORY KENNEDY’S NASA: 60 YEARS AND BEYOND TAKES A SWEEPING LOOK AT THE GOVERNMENT AGENCY AND ITS GOALS FOR THE FUTURE DURING ITS 60TH ANNIVERSARY
Film Builds on the Long-Standing History of Discovery Programming Highlighting NASA at a Momentous Moment In Its History
March 22, 2017
Humankind has come to lead the planet in large part thanks to its insatiable curiosity and remarkable ability to wonder. This “need to know” lies deep within our DNA, as we seek to answer the biggest questions: Where did we come from? Where are we going? Are we alone? That quest to understand has led us to make incredible discoveries and achieve extraordinary advances. No organization represents this supremely human quality better than NASA.
As this historic institution celebrates its 60th anniversary, Discovery once again shines a spotlight on NASA and the vital role it has to play moving forward into the coming decades. Directed and produced by Academy Award®-nominated and Emmy®-winning filmmaker Rory Kennedy (“Last Days of Vietnam”), the documentary feature, NASA: 60 Years and Beyond, will air on Discovery in 2018.
NASA’s historic commitment to dreaming big will inevitably lead to many more important discoveries over the next 60 years and beyond. With wide-ranging access to NASA leaders and scientists, the film will chronicle the scope of NASA’s work around the globe, to the farthest reaches of our solar system, and galaxies. Kennedy takes her cameras behind the scenes of the world’s greatest space agency, filming next-generation space telescopes, dazzling prototypes of Mars-bound spacecraft and cutting-edge missions to better understand Earth, the Moon, Mars, and beyond.
“Discovery’s core values of curiosity and exploration leap off the screen in NASA: 60 Years and Beyond,” states Rich Ross, Group President, Discovery Channel, Animal Planet, Science Channel, and Velocity. “Rory has assembled a wealth of stories about the organization that takes us to extraordinary places: from the ice caps of Antarctica and the coral reefs of Hawaii, to the surface of Mars, the search for exoplanets, and even back in time to the Big Bang.”
Kennedy says, “I’ve always admired the pioneering work done by NASA over its first six decades. From President Kennedy’s bold challenge that led to the first moonwalk through the launch of the game-changing Hubble Telescope and the global collaboration required to create the International Space Station. As we move into a new era of research and exploration, NASA’s extraordinary wealth of intelligence and limitless curiosity will fuel its work to better understand our Earth and the universe.”
NASA: 60 Years and Beyond is directed and produced by Rory Kennedy; produced by Clare Tucker, produced and written by Mark Bailey. For Discovery: supervising producer, Alexandra Moss; executive producer John Hoffman.