Elizabeth Leiter is a documentary filmmaker telling nuanced, emotionally resonant stories that challenge perspectives and connect audiences to the world around them.

Elizabeth made her directorial debut with Frontline’s The Abortion Divide, an intimate portrait of women navigating deeply personal decisions. She went on to direct Jane Goodall: The Hope, for National Geographic and Disney+. The film earned multiple honors, including an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Nature Programming, a Critics’ Choice nomination for Best First Documentary Feature, and a Producers Guild of America nomination for Television Feature.

Her most recent film, 399: Queen of the Tetons, opened the 2024 Big Sky Documentary Film Festival. Chronicling the life of the world’s most famous grizzly mother, the film explores the complex intersection of wilderness and human encroachment. It screened at the Seattle International Film Festival, Bend Film Festival, Mountainfilm, and others, and was a featured selection in the Redford Center’s Films That Move series. A broadcast version aired on PBS and earned an Emmy nomination.

Elizabeth has also brought her storytelling to documentary series work. She was the series director for Hulu’s Taste the Nation with Padma Lakshmi: Holiday Edition, which won a James Beard Award and received a Television Academy Honor for inspiring social change. Her producing credits include the Peabody-nominated PBS special Rising Against Asian Hate: One Day in March, National Geographic’s Parched, and the Sundance-winning feature This Is Home: A Refugee Story.

Born and raised in South Carolina, she now lives in Brooklyn.