At this precarious moment in American history it seems prudent, even necessary, to reexamine how we got here. Fortunately, we have In Pursuit: Philadelphia and the Making of America, a richly textured and thoughtfully crafted 10-part docuseries from History Making Productions.

In Pursuit was written by novelist and Hidden City co-founder Nathaniel Popkin, directed by multiple Mid-Atlantic Emmy Award winner Andrew Ferrett, and produced by Sam Katz, award-winning producer, director, and founder of History Making Productions. The docuseries turns the clock back to the 17th century and takes us on a journey through time and place while holding a mirror to the United States, Philadelphia, and, ultimately, ourselves. The collection is infused with lively recreations, dynamic cinematography, and imaginative visualizations of historic documents.

David Owen Bell caught up with director Andrew Ferrett to discuss production, process, and the pursuit of a life in film.

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David Bell: What does the phrase “in pursuit” mean to you as it relates to the concept of the series?

Andrew Ferrett: As the historian Sophia Rosenfeld says in Episode Three, the “pursuit of happiness,” named in the Declaration of Independence, offers “something like a scripture for what American life is going to be. You’ve been told in this very abstract way: Go for it.” When we recorded that interview, we did not yet have the title In Pursuit. Yet, the more we thought about the concept of the series, it became clear that each era could be defined by a different American pursuit. I think it is generally true that Americans are interested in pursuing happiness, but that usually means pursuing something else that you think will give you happiness–freedom, land, equality, wealth, escape, etc. So we worked a number of these concepts into the titles of the episodes. Sometimes the pursuits are collective or societal.

Each of our 10 episodes matches a period of time with a corresponding American pursuit, which is named in the episode title (“Freedom,” “Wealth,” etc.). The pursuits layer on and reverberate in the story over time, and the early ones start to pop up in later episodes. The pursuits arose out of similarities we observed across stories, and we were able to use the “pursuit” frame as a guiding star for each episode. We also looked at whether a story felt relevant to the American experiment as a whole. If a story seemed primarily of local relevance, we did not include it.

DB: Setting out to explore five centuries of history and presenting it to a wide audience over roughly 10 hours strikes me as a huge undertaking. What were the initial challenges in getting this project off the ground?

AF: When embarking on a project at this level of ambition the first major challenge is to get people to buy into your vision at all. In 2019, after we completed a docuseries on Philadelphia history for the local ABC affiliate, my collaborators and I realized that we were sitting on a much deeper and bigger story. 

Across hundreds of interviews we observed that Philadelphia’s history offers a strikingly true mirror on the history of the United States itself that goes well beyond the Declaration of Independence. With In Pursuit, we wanted to show how Philadelphians have lived and often defined the American experience–from the struggles for religious freedom, land, the abolition of slavery, and the creation and control of industry, to the dispossession of native peoples, the long fight for equal rights and lived equality, the transformations of urban renewal, immigration, and suburbanization. All of these are quintessentially Philadelphian and American pursuits. 

And yet, regardless of what we thought, the history of Philadelphia has rarely been presented to the nation as a mirror of U.S. history. In fact, no documentary had posited the “mirror” idea about another American city. Even Ric Burns’ wonderful 1999 series about New York makes it clear that New York’s unique history stands apart from much of the nation. That signaled to us that an opportunity existed, but there wasn’t a clear path for making this leap. We had to grapple with how to make Philadelphia’s story feel relevant to a wider audience of Americans, all without appearing boosterish or provincial. 

DB: What were the key production and post-production challenges you and your team faced? How were they overcome?

AF: The filmmaking challenge was sprawling: how to envision a unified, accurate, and cinematic arc that can carry a general audience across 10 hours and five centuries of history. In the first episode, for example, we knew people would connect with the deeply-felt beliefs of the original Lenape people and the English Quakers and their parallel and conflicting struggles to live their ideals of personal freedom and liberty amidst persecution. However, the available archival visuals don’t always yield perfect images for the stories we hope to tell, especially in the 1600s and 1700s, so we had to devise a combination of re-creations, scenic cinematography, and creative use of archival materials to bring life to passions from hundreds of years ago. 

History Making Productions’ remarkable interview archive, dating back almost two decades, posed unique challenges. We didn’t want In Pursuit to be visually limited by hundreds of studio interviews that we had already recorded. While they were beautifully photographed and contained essential storytelling, all were shot on the same neutral backdrop for economy of scale. I felt that the repetitive backdrop could make In Pursuit feel rather drab over 10+ hours. So, we produced Deepener segments that take the action out of doors at strategic points in each episode to re-set the visual palette as we watch some brilliant, deep thinkers reflect on Philadelphia history while at large in the city itself. We position these Deepeners at turning points in the story, which gives the added benefit of letting some information sink in before we push to the next chapter.

DB: Were the re-enactments the most time-consuming and labor-intensive aspects of production?

AF: It is true that we invested the largest portion of our production budget in dramatic re-creations spanning from the 1600s to the 1930s, aiming for credibility and authenticity in costumes, styling, locations, props, grit, and human density. I’m drawn to re-creations, partially because they can dramatically elevate the documentary as a whole and especially because they empower us to tell stories that exist without any visual documentation. The story of the enslaved man, Sampson, in our second episode, is a good example. From a story contained on only a few pieces of paper, re-creations allowed us to create a dramatic, vividly true picture of his experience.

We deliberately do not record dialogue for our scenes, but rather let our on-camera experts tell the story while our terrific audio post team creates sound design of the events we have dramatized. I favor the “silent movie” re-enactment approach with its resulting emphasis on action and expression.

Animations and b-roll are more budget-friendly routes for storytelling, but we ultimately felt our stories were so human and dramatic that they demanded the most dynamic cinematic approach that we could afford. Fortunately for us, Sam Katz convinced a broad array of donors and foundations to share our vision. That allowed us to work with a top-notch professional crew to realize the re-creations on the screen.

DB: In Pursuit features stunning aerial footage of Philadelphia. I assume this was accomplished with drones.

AF: Drones have changed the game for small documentary film companies. Not so long ago, getting aerial shots could mean hiring a helicopter with a specialized camera mount, all of which could run into tens of thousands of dollars. It has been fun to experiment with the agility and flexibility of drones, which can fly places a helicopter never could go and at a much lower cost.

DB: What other relatively new technology was used and how?

AF: Closer to the ground, our approach had some throwback qualities. Since much of Philadelphia’s fame arises from the documents created here, I wanted to bring our camera into archives to capture the way the handwriting and type press into the page on those documents. These tabletop shoots are time consuming and intricate, and are not often done any more with high-res digital scans usually available. Yet, I have always loved the tactile appearance of objects on camera in documentaries made years ago. It turns out the camera lens has a special ability to reveal the physical dimension of the page, which a scan doesn’t approach. When I see these pages through the camera, I think about how these words were written by real people like any of us.

DB: Was there new technology that was rejected?

AF: In Pursuit does not use any A.I.-generated imagery or video. Between our re-creation shoots, interviews, and office work, this project has employed over 100 film workers and artists in the Philadelphia area.

DB: You and your team worked with more than 30 collaborators and partners and more than 35 funders. With their privacy in mind, were there conflicting interests, agendas, points of view, or attempts to influence subject matter that needed to be resolved?

AF: As a director I cannot recall a project where I have felt less interference from funders or more freedom to construct the film as I intended. It was my goal to make an accurate, honest, fair, and engaging history that could connect with a broad array of people across differing points-of-view. Of course, we had internal debates that are natural in any creative project, but these stemmed from the perspectives of the filmmakers, not from any funder or partner attempting to sway our work. Over the years our team has delivered an impressive roster of civically-minded, entertaining films. It has been my experience that our funders come in with an understanding of our fair-minded and rigorous approach.

DB: Was there anything you wanted to do but couldn’t because of time or money?

AF: If we had more money and time (much easier said than done) I would have loved to produce dramatizations for the final third of the series. In Pursuit only includes dramatic re-creations through the seventh episode. The final three episodes–spanning the late 20th and early 21st century–draw upon archival footage and photos from newspapers, TV stations, and individuals to bring events to life. The storytelling doesn’t miss a beat, and in some ways feels even more immediate and authentic, but I can’t help but imagine how we could have applied our re-creation approach to this period. As a director, I feel invigorated when I’m creating scenes expressly to serve the film’s needs, and trying to design action as close to historical reality as possible, but time and budget did not allow us to take that on for the later episodes.

DB: How did your personal life change over the several years of this project? Did that impact your work?

AF: I first began working with Sam Katz on the predecessor to this project in 2008, so my personal life has changed quite a bit in those decades! I’ve since gotten married, moved several times, and later this summer we are expecting our first child. Given the total commitment required to realize a project like this, In Pursuit has probably shaped my life more than my life has shaped the project. 

The experience of living in Philadelphia while making a documentary about Philadelphia offers endless potential inputs, whether you’re looking for them or not. Practically every block you walk–or every person you talk to–can jog the memory about a story of some historical significance. I lived for many years in South Philadelphia where our writer Nathaniel Popkin also lives, so perhaps a little South Philly bias leaked into our story selection, but since it is the oldest settled part of the city, I’d argue that focus is deserved.

DB: What was it about this topic that attracted your interest?

AF: I have wanted to make historical documentaries since I watched Ken Burns’ The Civil War with my dad when I was seven years old. I think I was captivated by the unique pacing and evocative visuals that seemed to create the space for the past to live again. That series yielded many conceptual offshoots, all of which I imbibed enthusiastically, including the epic series The West directed by Stephen Ives, with whom I landed my first job after college. At Ives’ company, Insignia Films in New York, I received a major education about this style of filmmaking, and I wanted to make my own attempt at one of these ambitious and inclusive grand narratives. At that time I wanted to live in Philadelphia. It was a magical coincidence that I met Sam Katz here, who had the same ambition to make such a film about Philadelphia. That opened the door.

DB: How did the project evolve over its lifetime? Were there any significant course changes?

AF: It changed everything when we decided to re-conceptualize a five-hour series produced for local television into what ultimately became an 11-hour series for a wide audience. In 2019, when I made what turned out to be In Pursuit’s first pitch document, I used the working title Great Experiment 2020, because that’s the year I expected that we could have the former series recut and expanded along the same existing structural lines. However, as we started working it became evident that we needed to do a full overhaul to make this series work for a wide audience as we intended. Our ambitions, possibilities, technical needs, and obstacles started to multiply. We were able to continue working through the COVID-19 pandemic by transitioning to a remote editing and directing workflow over Zoom, but by the summer of 2021 our funding was exhausted. We had to take a years-long break before a new wave of fundraising made it possible for us to resume production in 2024.

DB: In Pursuit has received much-deserved critical praise. How will you personally gauge the success of this project?

AF: I consider the project a success in part because it now exists. Inertia would have led us to simply walk away from this work after the conclusion of the original series in 2019. The mammoth effort and sacrifices entailed just to get this engine running again, shared by my collaborators Nathaniel Popkin and Sam Katz, makes it very satisfying to see the episodes completed and posted for the world to see. Whatever happens from here, at least we have created a history program hopefully at the scale and scope that Philadelphia deserves.

DB: Much of this country’s history has been marked by violent conflicts between two diametrically opposed groups of people over land, independence, equality, slavery, or religion, to name a few. What are the parallels today and what can we learn from the past?   

AF: In this contentious semiquincentennial summer, the first parallel I observe is that the historical conflicts, fractiousness, and unease are not uncommon at any point in American history. So, if people think we’re falling apart now, then we’ve probably always been falling apart, and, yet, we are still together 250 years later.

It’s interesting that the template for the landmark national birthday was set by the Centennial in 1876, which was so spectacular and celebratory in part because the nation had barely survived a civil war just a decade prior. Many people were relieved, even amazed, that the country had actually made it to 100 years. I would say that the longevity of the experiment until now has a lot to do with the repetitive cycle of battling, dissenting, adapting, and amending what was exceptional in the world and gave the U.S. unique advantages for a couple of centuries. Unfortunately, that has faded in our oversorted, siloed, and algorithmically enthralled era. I think we can learn from the past by seeking more common ground.

DB: What ongoing role is there for Philadelphia in the making of America–today and in the future?

AF: I think Philadelphia remains the perfect place to study America because cities this old are always influenced by the past. They are also always changing and in motion, which makes them great cinematic subjects and compelling narrative puzzles. You can find something definitively American in every corner of Philadelphia, and the lively sidewalks, eclectic architecture, and busy streets are only more beautiful seen through the camera lens. 

Whether it remains such a mirror in the future is a difficult question to answer, because for so long Philadelphia’s major relevance rested on its size and economic significance in the nation at large. It was clear enough for a long time that what happened in Philadelphia–never less than the 5th largest city, 4th largest metro in the nation–mattered because it was one of the few places in the country that contained diverse millions. Yet, ever since 2010 that has started to change with somewhat surprising speed as other U.S. and global cities have boomed. Philadelphia now has many American peers in size, with Dallas, Miami, Washington D.C., Atlanta, Phoenix, and San Antonio all at least as big or bigger by one metropolitan definition or another. 

If this change had happened 100 years ago it would have been challenging to make In Pursuit because the argument for continuing national pace-setting would have been much harder to make. I could go on a side tangent about how Philadelphia’s urban form inspired imitations and extrapolations across the country, which would include places like St. Louis, Buffalo, Savannah, Detroit, Washington, and even New York. Yet, it seems like sprawling new cities are more likely to imitate Houston or Phoenix and that includes a less connected, less intimate way of life than what can be experienced in Philadelphia. 

DB: What impacts would you like to see In Pursuit have on historians, documentary film makers, or everyday Philadelphians?

AF: My approach to this project was inspired by the PBS historical docuseries boom of the 1990s when millions of viewers could be taken in by long-form documentaries. A classic feature of that era was eloquent, insightful narration. Many history documentaries today no longer use a narrator, preferring to intercut the perspectives of different commentators and let the viewer sort it out. Of course, the filmmaker is imprinting their perspective no matter what, so I find that narration actually allows for a pretty honest approach to filmmaking. 

It isn’t easy to write narration for five centuries of history, and the fact-checking has to be on-point. Across 10 episodes I find it essential to relate context and to give the viewer, who has invested all of this time with us, a guiding compass toward what we the filmmakers wish to express. We’ve also been lucky enough to work with actor Michael Boatman as a narrator for our films for over 15 years. When you have an interpreter as skilled and brilliant as Michael, the narration adds an even more transformative dimension.

DB: Can you give us an idea of what to look forward to in upcoming episodes?

AF: In Episode Five, spanning the Civil War and Reconstruction, we see the pursuit of “America” and what and for whom that nation is going to be. In the latter part of 2026, we are releasing five episodes that span the 20th century in detail, featuring interviews with eyewitnesses to the history described (Cecil B. Moore and civil rights, the Rizzo era, MOVE, the Rendell era). Many of these interviewees have since passed away, but we were fortunate enough to sit with them in lively interviews at the origins of the project years ago. 

I am particularly excited about the seventh episode “Renewal,” which features a close and rarely-seen exploration of the eye-popping physical transformations of Philadelphia neighborhoods from the 1920s to the 1960s, from the Parkway to Society Hill. Urban renewal was, of course, a national pursuit after World War II, but we found some fascinating pre-war origins for the concept among Philadelphians like Albert M. Greenfield and Edmund Bacon. Urban history enthusiasts and city planning buffs should keep an eye out for “Renewal” in September.

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Episode 5: “America 1838-1876” will premier on Thursday, July 16 at 6:45 p.m. at the Philadelphia Film Society Film Center, 1412 Chestnut Street. Register for free tickets HERE.

The first four episodes of In Pursuit are streaming on YouTube. For full information about the series see InPursuit.TV.

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