Dan Cogan - Producer of Academy Award Winning Documentary ICARUS

Angle on Producers with Carolina Groppa

Dan Cogan is one of the most prominent non-fiction producers working today. Both an Academy Award®- and Emmy Award®-winner, Dan founded Story Syndicate with Liz Garbus in 2019.

Previously, Dan was the founding Executive Director of Impact Partners. They provide the creative mentorship to help make films the strongest they can be, and the strategic guidance to achieve the widest possible audience for each film.

Impact has a unique model of equity investing into the documentary film community - pioneering a system where filmmakers and investors work together to achieve mutually beneficial goals of telling powerful stories, raising awareness about critical issues facing our world today, reaching mass audiences on a global scale, and creating revenue for their films.

He has produced more than 100 films and series, including:

Allen v. Farrow; Icarus, which won the 2018 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature; Won’t You Be My Neighbor?, which won the 2019 Independent Spirit Award for Best Documentary; The Cove, which won the 2010 Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature; and the Apollo, which won the 2020 Emmy for Outstanding Documentary.

Dan has been highly regarded by many colleagues, and while we’ve never worked together, I am a fan and advocate of how he amplifies filmmakers from all walks of life.

This week we dive deep into the documentary scene, discuss best practices for finding and maintaining investor relationships, and he explains the producer’s diagram for choosing projects.