Right now a vanguard of black documentarians is spearheading a cinematic reimagining and retelling of the African American experience. These filmmakers include Raoul Peck, Stanley Nelson, Ava DuVernay, and Spike Lee. At the forefront of this nonfiction motion picture movement is Sam Pollard, who co-won two Emmys for 2006’s Lee-directed When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts and was Academy Award–nominated along with Lee for 1997’s 4 Little Girls.

Pollard, who also received an Emmy for 2009’s By the People: The Election of Barack Obama, began his prolific producing and directing career making two episodes of the prestigious PBS civil rights series, Eyes on the Prize. The Harlem-raised talent’s outstanding filmography also includes Sammy Davis Jr: I’ve Gotta Be Me, ACORN and the Firestorm, and 2020’s MLK/FBI, a chilling expose of J. Edgar Hoover’s relentless surveillance of and vendetta against Dr Martin Luther King Jr.

Now Pollard is back with Citizen Ashe. Codirected with Rex Miller, this ninety-four-minute nonfiction biopic chronicles athlete-activist Arthur Ashe, who broke ethnic boundaries in the so-called “sport of kings” and fought for social justice off the tennis court.