Social Studies

Named by the New York Times as “America’s foremost visual chronicler of the plutocracy,” Emmy® Award–winning filmmaker/photographer Lauren Greenfield has produced groundbreaking work on youth culture, gender and consumerism for the last 25 years. Her documentary films, THIN, The Queen of Versailles, Generation Wealth and The Kingmaker, and photographs from her books, Fast Forward, Girl Culture, Thin and Generation Wealth, have been screened, published and exhibited around the world, as well as collected by major cultural institutions.Greenfield’s photography, which has crossed traditional boundaries of photojournalism, documentary and fine art, has been widely published in leading international magazines. Her photographs have won almost every award in the industry, including the International Center for Photography Infinity Award, the Lucie Award, the Paris Photography Prize, the Hasselblad Grant, the Community Awareness Award from the National Press Photographers Association and the Moscow Biennale People’s Choice Award.The Queen of Versailles was the opening night film of the 2012 Sundance Film Festival, won the Sundance Best Documentary Director Award, a Director’s Guild (DGA) nomination and was called by Vogue “one of the top documentaries of all time.” Generation Wealth opened the 2018 Sundance Film Festival, received a Writers Guild (WGA) nomination for Best Documentary Screenplay, and was released worldwide by Amazon Studios. Film Independent awarded Greenfield the Spirit of Independence Award in 2019. Her record-breaking Super Bowl ad #LikeAGirl (250+ million views) earned her 14 Cannes Lions, an Emmy and the Most Awarded Director by Ad Age, making her the first woman to earn this distinction.Greenfield’s multi-platform retrospective, Generation Wealth, was also a record-setting exhibition that opened in Los Angeles at the Annenberg Space for Photography in 2017, the International Center of Photography (New York City), the Nobel Peace Center (Oslo), the Fotomuseum (The Hague), Deichtorhallen Hamburg, the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art (Copenhagen), Fotografiska (Stockholm) and the Moscow Multimedia Museum.The Kingmaker, Greenfield’s latest film about Imelda Marcos and the Marcos’ return to power, premiered in 2019 at the Venice Film Festival, followed by Telluride, Toronto and London. The Kingmaker garnered a WGA nomination and three Critics Choice nominations. It was lauded by critics in the Philippines and around the world, and was named one of the Best Documentaries of 2019 by Variety, Hollywood Reporter, the Boston Globe, Chicago, Philadelphia and Bay Area critics.In 2019, Greenfield and her producing (and life) partner, Frank Evers, founded the award-winning production company Girl Culture Films, now Institute. Greenfield and Evers are also currently co-producing a Broadway musical based on her documentary The Queen of Versailles, with Stephen Schwartz (Wicked) composing the music and Kristin Chenoweth (also of Wicked) playing Jackie Siegel (2024). A Los Angeles native, she and her husband, Evers, have two sons and live in Venice, California.

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Greenfield has produced groundbreaking work on youth culture, gender, and consumerism for the last 25 years.

Headshot of Lauren Greenfield, Creator, Executive Producer, Writer, and Director of FX's Social Studies.

Lauren Greenfield | Executive Producer | FX's Social Studies

Lauren Greenfield