How ‘Frontline’ Turned Into an Oscar-Winning Documentary Juggernaut

This year’s documentary Oscar race will pit a cringe comedy maestro against the most decorated documentary film producer of the past decade. While plenty of ink has been spilled over Nathan Fielder and Lance Oppenheim’s form-shattering Elizabeth Holmes curio “You Can See Everything,” it would be a mistake to count out Raney Aronson-Rath.

Aronson-Rath has been at the helm of “Frontline,” PBS’ acclaimed investigative documentary series, since 2015. Under her watch, the program has won so many Emmys she’s lost count (it stands at 44) and launches around 20 documentaries a year. In 2024, it took home its first documentary Oscar for “20 Days in Mariupol,” a vivid and violent account of AP journalist Mstyslav Chernov and his colleagues’ time in the Ukrainian city as it withstood Russia’s invasion in early 2022.

A few days after Chernov and his team escaped Mariupol with their footage, he and Aronson-Rath got to work on the film. “‘20 Days in Mariupol’ was my debut film. [Raney] and the ‘Frontline’ team helped me practically and creatively transition from journalism to cinema, which is quite a challenge,” Chernov says, adding, “For many of us who are working on socially and politically relevant projects but cannot find a home and distributor, Raney is the last hope to get the film made and find its audience.”

Oscar night was “a surreal moment” for Aronson-Rath. “People kept asking me, ‘Are you going to do more of these?!” she recalls. The common refrain was that “Frontline” couldn’t do theatrical films, and then one day it hit her: “I realized I was in charge of ‘Frontline,’ and we had the funding and distribution, so why not?”

Aronson-Rath launched Frontline Features last November as a dedicated studio that premieres feature and short-form documentaries in festivals and theaters ahead of PBS airings. Its latest release is “One in a Million,” a feature doc from Itab Azzam and Jack MacInnes that follows an 11-year-old girl, Israa, over 10 years as she and her family flee war-torn Syria to Turkey before settling in Germany. A powerful examination of war, immigration and the ties that bind, the film won the Audience Award at this year’s Sundance Film Festival and is poised to earn an Oscar nomination. “I was there from the very beginning. They sent me raw footage of Israa when she was 10 years old,” explains Aronson-Rath, a producer on the film. “I had a feeling that Israa’s story was going to be amazing.”

On top of Aronson-Rath’s “extraordinary passion and professionalism,” Azzam is grateful that Frontline gave the project the benefit of time: “We were following real people going through major changes in their lives, which required patience, trust and a willingness to embrace uncertainty, and having that long-term commitment was essential,” explains Azzam. “Raney was always there with her unwavering belief in the film and her understanding that this wasn’t simply a story about refugees reaching Europe, but about what happens afterward: growing up in exile, searching for belonging and navigating identity.”

Frontline also lent valuable “editorial experience,” Azzam maintains. Aronson-Rath’s team typically assigns investigative reporters to aid projects, conduct deep legal reviews and analyze rushes to make sure they meet their editorial standards.

Aronson-Rath caught the journalism bug writing for The China Post, an English-language newspaper for expats in Taipei, after graduating from the University of Wisconsin. While attending the Columbia Journalism School, she caught a screening of Steve James’ 1994 documentary “Hoop Dreams” at Film Forum in downtown Manhattan. “It was a really transcendent moment for me,” she remembers. “I’d found the form that I love.”

Years later, Aronson-Rath worked closely with James on “Abacus: Small Enough to Jail,” about a family-owned bank in Manhattan’s Chinatown that was the only financial institution to face criminal charges following the 2008 financial crisis; the doc earned “Frontline” its first Oscar nomination in 2018. “Public television has for decades tried to broaden its appeal to younger audiences, often without success,” says James. “From the day Raney took over, it was clear that she wanted to find more innovative ways to tell powerful true stories.”

Frontline has, under Aronson-Rath, proven intensely popular among younger generations. Its YouTube channel has 4.8 million subscribers — eclipsing 1 billion views in July with an astonishing 422 million hours watched. It also has three features lined up for 2027, including Chernov’s next film, which Aronson-Rath will be producing. “One of the others is a film I’ve been working on for 20 years with a filmmaker named Dan Edge,” she shares, “focusing on one character we met two decades ago who came back from Iraq.”