Surging Forward

To capture the barrier-breaking 2018 election, first-time director Wendy Levine Sachs ’93 co-directed and produced Surge, a feature documentary film that follows three female candidates who fought to flip their districts from red to blue in the last midterm election. “We followed a diverse group of candidates who reflected the surge that was happening in 2018 and the record numbers of women who were running for the very first time,” says Sachs, a former Capitol Hill press secretary, Emmy Award–winning TV news producer, author and media strategist. Surge was released on Showtime and Amazon just before the presidential election. Sachs hopes the film will inspire young women to embrace the power of grassroots activism. “The film is not just about women running for office but about the women who got behind the women running for office. Surge shows us what representative democracy looks like and how it’s up to us to make sure that 2018 was not a moment but a true movement,” Sachs says.