10 Facts About Tom Thurman

Tom Thurman was born on March 26,1962 and is an American filmmaker.

Programs in this series created by Tom Thurman include In the Garden of Music, Picture This and Crossing Mulholland.

Tom Thurman was born in Christiansburg, Kentucky, a small farming community in Shelby County.

Tom Thurman subsequently taught in the English departments at Tulane University and Berea College, and in 2012,2017 and 2018 was a visiting lecturer in film studies at Centre College.

Tom Thurman began his role as director with a documentary on the late Kentucky character actor Warren Oates in 1992.

Tom Thurman has since produced and directed a string of feature-length independent documentaries that have aired on PBS and cable networks such as Starz, Encore and The Sundance Channel.

Tom Thurman then shifted from film history to music as he embarked upon a project documenting the life and career of Atlantic Records producer Jerry Wexler.

In 1998, when Wexler was in Memphis receiving an award for his contributions to that city's musical heritage, Thurman asked Wexler what he wanted written on his tombstone.

In 2013, Tom Thurman directed a documentary for Kentucky Television about Louisville native Wendy Whelan, a principal dancer with the New York City Ballet.

Tom Thurman is currently completing a documentary about famed Kentucky author Robert Penn Warren, the only American author to have received a Pulitzer Prize in poetry and fiction.