Matthew O'Neill (filmmaker)
Matthew O'Neill is a documentary filmmaker best known for his work on the HBO film Baghdad ER, for which he and co-creator Jon Alpert won three Emmy Awards.
He and Alpert were nominated for a 2010 Academy Award for their film about the 2008 Sichuan earthquake. They were nominated again for a 2013 Academy Award for their film Redemption about individuals in New York City, known as canners, who survive by collecting cans and bottles from trash and recycling bins and redeeming them for money.
He has been involved with Downtown Community Television Center since 1997. He primarily produces films about subjects outside the United States including In Tahrir Square: 18 Days of Egypt's Unfinished Revolution about the Egyptian Revolution for HBO,Turkey's Tigers about the rise of religious Islamic businessmen in Turkey for PBS' Wide Angle and Venezuela: Revolution in Progress which aired on Discovery Times.
O'Neill is a graduate of Yale University.
O'Neill is also an accomplished long distance open water swimmer. He has successfully completed the 12 mile swim across the Strait of Gibraltar from Spain to Morocco without a wetsuit. At the time of his crossing he was one of fewer than four hundred people to ever complete the swim.
