JayCollier.net

PBS National Video Preview for Shoah

I produced and directed a national video campaign for this nine-hour documentary while working at PBS headquarters in Alexandria, Virginia, in 1987. The announcer was Robert J. Lurtsema from WGBH-FM in Boston and the music score was by Demos Chrissos Productions in Washington, DC.

Here is the script for the 90-second version; there were also three other versions used to promote the national broadcast premiere of the landmark documentary.

 

Fade up to graphic.

Sound: freight train rumbles toward viewer.

Train moves toward camera

Ambient score begins.

SHOAH. . . THE HEBREW WORD WHICH MEANS ANNIHILATION.

Conductor stares at Treblinka from stopped train.

THE FEW SURVIVING EYEWITNESSES TO AUSCHWITZ, TREBLINKA, THE WARSAW GHETTO . . .

Man and reporter in train yard.

. . . RELIVE, IN THEIR OWN WORDS, HAUNTING MEMORIES OF THE NAZI DEATH CAMPS...

Move through death camp. Fade to black.

...WHERE NEARLY SIX MILLION MEN, WOMEN, AND CHILDREN WERE EXECUTED.

Fade up to graphic.

Sound: ambient music and sound effects continue during graphic.

Dissolve to train approaching.

 

Lanzmann with survivor.

YOU'VE SEEN HOLOCAUST FOOTAGE BEFORE. NOW HEAR THE STORY FROM THOSE WHO WERE THERE.

Female survivor.

"There was a terrible screaming — out, out, out!"

Male survivor.

"A minute, an hour before, you were part of a family: a wife, a husband.

Now, all of a sudden, everything is dead."

Another male survivor.

Fade to black at end.

"The product in Auschwitz was death. Everything was geared to keep the crematoria running."

Fade up to graphic.

DON'T MISS THE LANDMARK, FOUR-PART TELEVISION PREMIERE OF SHOAH . . .

Pan cemetery. Tilt up to sky. Fade to black.

. . . PERSONAL MEMORIES OF A PLACE AND TIME WHICH MUST NOT BE FORGOTTEN.