HWS News
10 July 2025 • Alums Schwartz '12 Wins Emmy
Documentary Producer Emma Schwartz ’12 was honored for her work exposing the monopolization of food and water.
At this year’s 46th Annual News & Documentary Emmy Awards held in New York City, documentary producer Emma Schwartz ’12 was part of the team that recently took home the award for Outstanding Research-Documentary.
Schwartz was part of a team of researchers for “The Grab” (2024, Magnolia + Participant), a film that follows how governments, private investors and mercenaries are working to seize food and water resources at the expense of entire populations. Combining journalism from The Center for Investigative Reporting with storytelling from director Gabriela Cowperthwaite, “The Grab” takes viewers around the globe, from Arizona to Zambia, to reveal one of the world’s biggest and least-known threats.
“There’s so much at stake in this arena that one half expects these journalist heroes to be silenced along the way,” writes Variety in its review. “For that reason, “The Grab” unspools like a thriller in one sense and a dystopian science fiction movie in another.”
Schwartz has previously served as the producer for “The Power of the Dream” (2024, Amazon Studios) and “Blindsided” (2023, CNN + MAX). In 2019, she received an International Documentary Association award for “Brewed in Palestine,” which she directed and produced. In recent years, she’s worked on projects with Frontline, Netflix, GQ Magazine, Time Magazine, PBS, The Washington Post and The Center for Investigative Reporting.
Outside of the United States, she has produced work in Zambia, India, Argentina, Singapore, China, Dominican Republic, Palestine, Israel, Jordan, Kenya, Mexico, Ukraine and Nicaragua.
After graduating from HWS with her degree in Media and Society, Schwartz earned a master’s in journalism from the University of California Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism, specializing in long-form documentary storytelling with a focus on human rights and investigative journalism. She is based in Brooklyn, N.Y.
Top: Emma Schwartz '12 holds her Emmy at the 46th Annual News & Documentary Emmy Awards in New York City.
