Top Honors Go to Bernardo Ruiz’s “Roberto Clemente”
LOS ANGELES, CA, AUGUST 25 —Latino Public Broadcasting (LPB), a non-profit organization funded by The Corporation for Public Broadcasting and PBS’ AMERICAN EXPERIENCE, announced today that “ROBERTO CLEMENTE” won the 2008 NCLR ALMA Award® for Outstanding Made-for-Television Documentary. Produced by writer/director Bernardo Ruiz, the AMERICAN EXPERIENCE documentary chronicles the life of an exceptional baseball player and committed humanitarian, who challenged racial discrimination to become baseball’s first Latino superstar. ROBERTO CLEMENTE premiered in April 2008 and is now streaming online at http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/clemente in English and Spanish.
“Latino Public Broadcasting is proud of Bernardo’s accomplishment, and salutes AMERICAN EXPERIENCE and PBS for bringing this moving portrait of a Latino hero to television audiences. LPB also congratulates the other five Alma Award nominees in the documentary category, all of whom were supported by us,” said Patricia Boero, Executive Director of LPB.
“We’re honored to have the opportunity to tell this story,” says AMERICAN EXPERIENCE executive producer Mark Samels. “Roberto Clemente was much more than an athlete—he channeled that fame into a larger mission of helping people, broke racial barriers, and continues to inspire today.”
The 2008 NCLR ALMA Awards were taped on August 17 at the Pasadena Civic Auditorium. The all-star event, which celebrates the outstanding artistic achievements of Latinos in motion pictures, television and music, airs Friday, September 12 (8:00-10:00 p.m., ET), on the ABC Television Network.
Television and film actress, Eva Longoria Parker, returned once again as executive producer and host of the telecast. Special honors were presented to Linda Ronstadt, Shakira, and Narciso Rodriguez whose work has impacted the entertainment industry and influenced American culture. Edward James Olmos, LPB’s Chairman, also received an award for Outstanding Actor in a Drama Television Series.
The two-hour special was presented by the National Council of La Raza (NCLR) – the largest national Hispanic civil rights and advocacy organization in the U.S. The annual ALMA (American Latino Media Arts) Awards recognizes and celebrates the outstanding artistic achievement of Latinos in film, television, and music. The ALMA Awards was created by NCLR in 1995 as part of its strategy to promote the diverse, accurate, and balanced portrayals of Latinos in the media and the enhancement of the Latino image in the entertainment industry. The show is an example of how inclusion strengthens the entertainment industry, just as diversity strengthens our country.
About the ALMA Awards®
The National Council of La Raza (NCLR) is the largest national Latino civil rights and advocacy organization in the U.S. NCLR created the ALMA Awards in 1995 as part of its strategy to promote fair, accurate, and balanced portrayals of Latinos in the entertainment industry. The show was named “ALMA” (Spanish for “spirit” or “soul”) which represents the determined spirit of the Latino people in an effort to reflect the spirit as well as the scope of the awards program.
For 40 years, NCLR has been promoting the advancement of Latino families in this country, creating opportunities and opening doors. The NCLR ALMA Awards are an integral part of that mission: a television entertainment special with a cause – to show how diversity strengthens our country and how inclusion strengthens the entertainment industry. For more information on the 2008 NCLR ALMA Awards®, please visit www.almaawards.com.
ABOUT LPB
Latino Public Broadcasting (LPB) is a non-profit organization funded by The Corporation for Public Broadcasting. LPB’s mission is to support the development, production, post-production, acquisition and distribution of non-commercial educational and cultural television that is representative of Latino people, or addresses issues of particular interest to Latino Americans. These programs are produced for dissemination to the public broadcasting stations, and other public telecommunication entities. By acting as a minority consortium, LPB provides a voice to the diverse Latino community throughout the United States. Since 1998, LPB has brought over 100 hours of Latino content to PBS.
Contact:
Luis Ortiz, Managing Director
Phone: 
818-847-9656
Email: luis.ortiz@lpbp.org
ABOUT AMERICAN EXPERIENCE
Television’s most-watched history series, AMERICAN EXPERIENCE has been hailed as
“peerless” (Wall Street Journal), “the most consistently enriching program on television”
(Chicago Tribune), and “a beacon of intelligence and purpose” (Houston Chronicle). On air and online, the series brings to life the incredible characters and epic stories that have shaped America’s past and present. Acclaimed by viewers and critics alike, AMERICAN
EXPERIENCE documentaries have been honored with every major broadcast award, including twenty-four Emmy Awards, four duPont-Columbia Awards, and fourteen
George Foster Peabody Awards, one most recently for Two Days in October.
ABOUT WGBH BOSTON
WGBH Boston is America’s preeminent public broadcasting producer. More than one- third of PBS’s prime-time lineup and companion Web content as well as many public radio favorites are produced by WGBH. The station also is a pioneer in educational multimedia and in access technologies for people with disabilities. For more information visit wgbh.org.
For more information about AMERICAN EXPERIENCE and Roberto Clemente, visit
pbs.org/americanexperience
Promotional photography is available for download from pbs.org/pressroom and
pressroom.wgbh.org.
CONTACTS
To request a screener or schedule an interview, please contact:
Patrick Ramirez, WGBH, 617.300.4251,patrick_ramirez@wgbh.org
Jen Holmes, WGBH, 617.300.5388,jen_holmes@wgbh.org
Laura Bowman, WGBH, 617.300.5332,laura_bowman@wgbh.org