Chicken may be just food for most people, but raising the perfect chicken is an all-consuming passion for some. CMT has partnered with Emmy Award-winning Motto Pictures, and Emmy nominated director Nicole Lucas Haimes for “Chicken People,” a documentary that takes a charming and fascinating look at the colorful and hugely competitive world of champion show chicken breeders. A real life “Best in Show” but about chickens, the film follows the struggles and triumphs of both humans and their chickens on the road to compete at the Ohio National Poultry Show, considered the Westminster of Chickens.
Nicole Lucas Haimes is an award-winning documentary filmmaker and journalist best known for her richly observed character portrayals and her incisive exploration of little-known worlds. Her work has played in major film festivals and has been seen worldwide. Her feature documentaries include the New York Times critic pick CHICKEN PEOPLE, which prior to its 2016 theatrical release opened at SXSW where it was nominated for the festival's Gamechanger award, and at Nashville, nominated for the Grand Jury prize prior to airing on CMT. The critically acclaimed THE GOOD, THE BAD, THE HUNGRY, for the Emmy Award-winning series ESPN Films 30 For 30, premiered at Tribeca 2019.
Other credits include CBS, BET, and the ABC News flagship documentary series, TURNING POINT. For PBS, Haimes wrote, produced, and directed the Emmy-nominated CRACKING THE CODE. She wrote, directed and co-executive produced for A&E, CONFESSIONS OF THE DC SNIPER, featuring the first exclusive interview with Lee Boyd Malvo. She was the showrunner for Z Living's Conquered, a 6 episode docu-series profiling extraordinary stories of courage and triumph.
Currently, Nicole is directing with Charles Burnett the feature documentary Untitled Policing Documentary, which was selected for a Women In Film Sundance Film Financing and Strategy Fellowship and is supported by The Ford Foundation, Catapult Film Fund, Field of Vision, Rogovy Foundation and IDA Enterprise. among others.