Alison Klayman (director / producer / cinematographer) is a freelance journalist and documentary filmmaker. While living in China from 2006-2010, she produced radio and television feature stories for PBS Frontline, National Public Radio, AP Television and others. She also began shooting her debut documentary feature, Ai WeiWei: Never Sorry, following the artist/activist for two years and gaining unprecedented access to his life and work. The film was awarded a Special Jury Prize for Spirit of Defiance at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival.
When Chinese authorities detained Ai for three months in Spring 2011, Klayman made many media appearances to speak about Ai and her work, including CNN International and The Colbert Report. She has since been named a Sundance Documentary Producing Fellow, and included in Filmmaker Magazine’s annual list of “25 New Faces of Independent Film.”
She grew up in the Philadelphia area and graduated from Brown University in 2006 with an honors B.A. degree in History. There she won both a C.V. Starr National Service Fellowship, and an Associated Press College Radio Award for General Reporting. She speaks Mandarin Chinese and Hebrew.
