Judy Chaikin

Judy Chaikin

Judy Chaikin is a graduate of AFI’s Directing Workshop for Women and is best known for writing, producing and directing the Emmy® nominated PBS documentary, Legacy of the Hollywood Blacklist.   Her short romantic comedy, Cotillion ‘65, appeared in over 30 film festivals winning Best Short, Best Comedy, Best Director and Audience Choice Awards.

Chaikin performed in and directed improv comedy, working with groups such as the Committee Workshop, The Synergy Trust and The Groundlings. She directed the comedy pilot, On The Television,for Nickelodeon and the reality pilot, American Families, for Fox TV.

A Supervising Producer and Director on the ABC series, FBI: The Untold Stories, Chaikin also co-produced the CBS Movie of the Week, Stolen Innocence. She wrote and directed the bi-lingual PBS documentary, Los Pastores, and won the Blue Ribbon at the American Educational Film and TV Festival for the docu-drama, Sojourner Truth: Ain’t I A Woman, featuring Julie Harris.

Chaikin’s current film, The Girls in the Band, won six Best Documentary Awards, premiered theatrically at Lincoln Center, was a NY Times Critic Pick and is currently showing on PBS both nationally and internationally. Her feature length comedy screenplay, Ai! Chilito, won first place at the Broad Comedy Screenplay Competition, was a runner-up at the ScreenCraft Comedy Competition and was selected as a “Pitch Project” for the 2017 PGA “Produced By” weekend.

Chaikin comes from a family of musicians and played piano and trumpet until the age of 13, when she realized that the music business was no place for a girl. So she quit music and became a director…what was she thinking???