Bio — MAT HAMES

Mat Hames

Wind River Reservation

Filming ‘What Was Ours’ in Wyoming.

Pushkar, Rajastan, India

Wales, UK

Pushkar, India

Kyoto, Japan

Wind River Reservation, Wyoming, USA

Pont du Gard, France

Caesarea Aquaduct, Israel

RESUME (PDF)

Mat Hames is an Emmy Award winning Producer and Director, known for his documentaries included on Independent Lens, Amazon Prime, AppleTV, SundanceTV, Netflix, and Kanopy. He also is a founder of Alpheus Media, a studio that produces content for global brands. He was Knighted by King Albert the II of Belgium for his work on his film about the Belgian Resistance, Last Best Hope.

Hames’ directorial debut, Last Best Hope, traced a downed P-47 pilot’s journey through escape lines in Belgium during WWII. His next film When I Rise premiered at the SXSW Film Festival and HotDocs in Canada, and went on to win awards at 10 additional festivals, before being nominated for an IDA Award. Hames spent the next three years making What Was Ours (Prime Video) on the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming while simultaneously continuing to manage Alpheus Media’s commercial brand work. What Was Ours received a prestigious ITVS Open Call grant, had an award winning festival run, was included in Independent Lens on PBS, and was recently featured on HBO’s This Week Tonight with John Oliver.

Hames also made the short Fighting Goliath, narrated by Robert Redford. Later, his acclaimed 12 hour long PBS series Power Trip: the Story of Energy recieved funding from the Sloan Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, and Pritzker Innovation Fund. Based on the book by Michael Webber, the Power Trip series captures the sweeping history of energy history with interviews with over 100 historians, scientists and energy policy makers. For Power Trip, Hames leads an international production team to film in Iceland, Japan, Singapore, Israel, France, Italy, Wales, England, Ireland and the USA. The series is in it’s second season, won two Telly Awards and is now streaming on all the major platforms.

Power Trip: The Story of Energy has to date been seen by more than 10 million viewers on networks in over 10 countries. PBS selected Power Trip to debut it’s new streaming platform on Prime, PBS Documentaries, where it was a Top 10 series. Additionally, PBS selected Power Trip to feature on it’s official YouTube channel for it’s 1.3 million subscribers.

His series A State of Mind has won four National Academy of Television Arts and Science Heartland Chapter Emmy Awards, while being nominated for six. His television documentary Fossil Country was nominated for the 45th Annual News and Doc Emmy Awards, and won a regional Emmy.

Hames also made a portrait of two Native American Artists, The Art of Home (PBS Living Channel), filmed in Santa Fe, Denver, and Wyoming.

Hames is a co-founder of production studio Alpheus Media, based in Austin Texas, where he currently oversees a core staff of 10. In addition to documentaries, with Alpheus Media, Mat has also directed national TV commercials for global brands, and made short films for clients like Warner Bros, The Economist, Johns Hopkins, University of Texas and MD Anderson Cancer Center, as well as hundreds of online video campaigns for cause-based brands such as LIVESTRONG, Movember, Athletes for Hope, Partners in Health, and Bill and Economist Educational Foundation.