Mary-Jane Doherty

Mary Jane Doherty (MJ,) Associate Professor Emerita, taught film production courses including her innovative approach to the Narrative Documentary.  She got her start at MIT’s Film/Video Program under Ricky Leacock, where she filmed GRAVITY, the story of Dr Rainer Weiss (Rai) and his students building a prototype gravitational wave antenna; a story she thought was over until, 3 decades later, Rai wins the Nobel Prize for proving Einstein was right.  It was sheer coincidence that MJ happened to film the early days of experimentation, before there was the least notion of possible success.  MJ has now released the award-winning  COSMIC CODA, a story merging Rai’s early work with Astrophysics as it is today.

Meanwhile, while teaching, MJ made two feature films about children within the Cuban Ballet System: SECUNDARIA and PRIMARIA and two shorts – LET THE RIVER RUN and THE FISHING WIDOWS OF BAY ST LAWRENCE.  All found HERE. These projects have screened internationally, received national press and two solo theatrical Award screenings. In April 2017 she received her first solo retrospective in Cambridge, MA and also that year the Inaugural Boston Artists Fellowship .  MJ became a St Botolph Fellow 2023.

MJ also combines prose with videos; her debut prose piece, THE FISHING WIDOWS OF BAY ST LAWRENCE received Runner Up for the 2022 Montana Prize in Non-Fiction, while a combined prose and video version is now featured at PilgrimOnline magazine.  She’s published three other essays: on the mystery of sound, narrative documentary filmmaking and early music education.  MJ is now in the early stages of filming her first narrative feature set in Puerto Rico.