Jac Venza (born 1926/1927) is an American

public television Public broadcasting involves radio, television and other electronic media outlets whose primary mission is public service. Public broadcasters receive funding from diverse sources including license fees, individual contributions, public financing ...

producer who is directly responsible for most of the theatre and music programs that have been seen on

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...

since its creation in 1970. From the early 1960s until his retirement in 2005, Venza brought such programs as ''

NET Playhouse ''NET Playhouse'' was an American dramatic television anthology series produced by National Educational Television. NET subsequently merged with WNDT Newark to form WNET, and was superseded by the Public Broadcasting Service, though the NET title ...

'', ''

Live from Lincoln Center ''Live from Lincoln Center'' is a seventeen-time Emmy Award-winning series that has broadcast notable performances from the Lincoln Center in New York City on PBS since 1976. The program airs between six and nine times per season. Episodes of ''L ...

'', ''

American Playhouse ''American Playhouse'' is an American anthology television series periodically broadcast by Public Broadcasting Service (PBS). Overview It premiered on January 12, 1982, with ''The Shady Hill Kidnapping'', written and narrated by John Cheever an ...

'', ''

American Masters ''American Masters'' is a PBS television series which produces biographies on enduring writers, musicians, visual and performing artists, dramatists, filmmakers, and those who have left an indelible impression on the cultural landscape of the ...

'', and ''

Great Performances ''Great Performances'' is a television anthology series dedicated to the performing arts; the banner has been used to televise theatrical performances such as plays, musicals, opera, ballet, concerts, as well as occasional documentaries. It is pr ...

'' to millions of viewers. He won a Personal

Peabody Award The George Foster Peabody Awards (or simply Peabody Awards or the Peabodys) program, named for the American businessman and philanthropist George Peabody, honor the most powerful, enlightening, and invigorating stories in television, radio, and ...

in 1998.58th Annual Peabody Awards
May 1999. He began his career on

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainmen ...

in the 1950s, where he began to notice the scarcity of programming devoted to the

fine arts In European academic traditions, fine art is developed primarily for aesthetics or creative expression, distinguishing it from decorative art or applied art, which also has to serve some practical function, such as pottery or most metalwork ...

on television. It was his dream to bring more of it to the home screen on a regular basis, but he did not receive a full opportunity to do so until the creation of

National Educational Television National Educational Television (NET) was an American non-commercial educational, educational terrestrial television, broadcast television network owned by the Ford Foundation and later co-owned by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. It o ...

, where it soon became possible, thanks largely to Venza, to see great dramatic literature regularly performed by some of the world's most renowned actors. A then-unknown

Dustin Hoffman Dustin Lee Hoffman (born August 8, 1937) is an American actor and filmmaker. As one of the key actors in the formation of New Hollywood, Hoffman is known for his versatile portrayals of antiheroes and emotionally vulnerable characters. He is th ...

made his first major television appearance in a play—

Ronald Ribman Ronald Burt Ribman (born May 28, 1932) is an American author, poet and playwright.Much of the information in this article comes from a submission by the subject himself and is archived on the OTRS system as ticke2008073010036244/ref> "As poet-pl ...

's ''The Journey of the Fifth Horse''—on NET in 1966. ''NET Playhouse'' was perhaps the first television anthology to present commercial-free, full-length productions (rather than one-hour or ninety-minute adaptations) of theatrical classics such as

Arthur Miller Arthur Asher Miller (October 17, 1915 – February 10, 2005) was an American playwright, essayist and screenwriter in the 20th-century American theater. Among his most popular plays are '' All My Sons'' (1947), ''Death of a Salesman'' ( ...

's adaptation of

Ibsen Henrik Johan Ibsen (; ; 20 March 1828 – 23 May 1906) was a Norwegian playwright and theatre director. As one of the founders of modernism in theatre, Ibsen is often referred to as "the father of realism" and one of the most influential playw ...

's ''

An Enemy of the People ''An Enemy of the People'' (original Norwegian title: ''En folkefiende''), an 1882 play by Norwegian playwright Henrik Ibsen, followed his previous play, ''Ghosts'', which criticized the hypocrisy of his society's moral code. That response inclu ...

''. When NET became PBS, Venza quickly launched ''Great Performances'', which is still running today. Upon his retirement from PBS, the

Corporation for Public Broadcasting The Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) is an American publicly funded non-profit corporation, created in 1967 to promote and help support public broadcasting. The corporation's mission is to ensure universal access to non-commercial, ...

awarded Venza the

Ralph Lowell Major Ralph Lowell (July 23, 1890 – May 15, 1978) was a World War I veteran, banker, and philanthropist from Boston. Lowell was born in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, to John and Mary Emlen Lowell (Lowell 1899, p 302). Lowell graduated f ...

medal. He held the record for the most

Emmy The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the calendar year, each with the ...

nominations for an individual—fifty-seven—until 2010.

References

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* Date of birth missing (living people) Living people PBS people American television producers Peabody Award winners International Emmy Founders Award winners Year of birth missing (living people) {{US-tv-producer-stub

References

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