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Dr.
Ted Baehr is an award-winning producer, writer, director,
radio & TV personality, and scholar. With all these
accomplishments, his one job is helping to redeem the values
of the media while educating audiences on how to use
discernment in selecting their entertainment.
Dr. Baehr is the Chairman of the Christian Film and
Television Commission, a non-profit organization committed
to educating the entertainment industry and the general
public of the media’s impact on its audiences. He also
serves as the publisher of
MOVIEGUIDE ® : A Family Guide to Entertainment based on
biblical values, and he writes a syndicated column for 29
publications nationwide. Baehr’s radio and TV programs,
"
MOVIEGUIDE®: A Family Guide to Movies and
Entertainment," is syndicated nationally and
internationally.
Utilizing eighteen years of research in evaluating the
impact of the media on both children and adults, Dr. Baehr
has been featured on numerous shows such as Oprah, CNN,
Geraldo, Entertainment Tonight, The 700 Club, and the Morton
Downey, Jr. Show. His opinions, critiques and insights are
featured in major newspapers and magazines throughout the
United States including USA Today, The Los Angeles Times,
The Washington Post, The Hollywood Reporter, and U. S. News
and World Report.
Dr. Baehr lectures, teaches and preaches throughout the
world. He has lectured at The House of Lords of The
Parliament of The U.K., taught at the Bombay Communication
Institute, lectured at Dartmouth College, University of
Virginia and at U.C.L.A.
Dr. Baehr’s books include THE MEDIA-WISE FAMILY {Chariot
Victor}, GETTING THE WORD OUT {Harper and Row}, THE
CHRISTIAN FAMILY GUIDE TO MOVIES AND VIDEO (Volumes 1 and 2)
{Wolgemuth and Hyatt}, and HOLLYWOOD'S REEL OF FORTUNE: A
WINNING STRATEGY TO REDEEM THE ENTERTAINMENT INDUSTRY {Coral
Ridge Ministries}. He is also a contributing author to
RELIGION AND PRIME TIME TELEVISION {Praeger}.
Dr. Baehr is past president of the Episcopal
Radio-Television Foundation, an organization that won an
Emmy Award for Best Animated Special: "The Chronicles
Of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe,"
aired as a CBS special during his tenure and was watched by
more than 37 million viewers. Dr. Baehr was nominated for an
Emmy Award for the PBS Series, "Perspectives: War and
Peace," in which Ted served as the executive producer
and host.
Dr. Baehr has received five Angel Awards from Excellence in
Media, a Chicago Intercom Silver Plaque, the prestigious
Wilbur Award, two awards from the Southern California Motion
Picture Council, The President’s Award from ICVA/ICCM, the
coveted Religious Heritage of America Faith and Freedom
Award, and the Covenant Award from the Radio Television
Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention. In 1982, Dr.
Baehr received international recognition for his work as
Executive Producer of "The Power" Exhibit at the
World’s Fair, which was a combined effort of 15
denominations working together.
Presently, Ted serves on the board or board of advisors of
more than 20 organizations, including the Religious Heritage
of America, National Religious Broadcasters, the American
Theater of Actors, and the Theological Summit Conference. He
is a member of the United Seniors Association and an active
member of the National Academy of Television Arts and
Sciences and the Press Club.
Ted Baehr was born in 1946, the son of Robert
"Tex" Allen/AKA Theodore Baehr and Evelyn Peirce,
both successful stage, screen, and television actors.
Growing up in New York, Ted followed in his parent’s
footsteps, performing in commercials, movies, television,
and stage.
After studying abroad at the University of Munich, Germany;
Cambridge University, England; and Bordeaux and Toulouse
Universities in France, he graduated with high distinction
in Comparative Literature and as a Rufus Choate Scholar from
Dartmouth College. He then received his Juris Doctor from
New York University School of Law, where he served as the
editor of the New York Law School Newspaper.
It wasn’t until 1975 that Baehr’s life turned. While Ted
was financing independent movies for Canon Films, a friend
suggested that he read the Bible, which changed his
perspective both professionally and personally.
Baehr decided to attend seminary at the Institute of
Theology at the Cathedral of St. John The Divine. He
accepted a position as the Director of the Television Center
at the City University in New York, and started the Good
News Communications Ministry. He also established the
Episcopal ‘Communicate’ Workshops.
During his tenure at the University, Baehr worked closely on
communications with academia, researching the impact of the
media in education. The subject became a primary topic at
the Annenberg Conference on Communication at Temple
University, where Baehr received national recognition.
He was elected President of the Episcopal Radio &
Television Foundation in 1979 and began conceptualizing what
would later become the Christian Film and Television
Commission.
In 1983, while serving on the Communications Board of the
National Council of Churches and the National Religious
Broadcasters, Baehr met George Heimrich. Heimrich was
director of the Protestant Film Office in the 1950s and
1960s. Inspired by George Heimrich, Ted began contacting
prominent members of the industry, and in 1986, formed the
Christian Film and Television Commission. Ted did research
and is now working on a book on the subject. Heimrich
donated his Protestant Film Office files to the Christian
Film and Television Commission where they now reside.
Since then, the Christian Film and Television Commission has
served as a liaison, working with studio executives in
understanding the needs and concerns of the general public
for wholesome, family entertainment.
In 1985, noting a need to help advise parents (he is a
husband and father of four children) and people concerned
about morality in movies, Ted began publishing MOVIEGUIDE®,
a biweekly magazine which reviews all movies from a biblical
perspective. MOVIEGUIDE® is a reliable guide to moviegoers
in helping them choose the good and reject the bad.
MOVIEGUIDE’s very accurate content ratings, notes not only
sex, violence and profanity, but also worldview and other
important criteria.
From the detailed information that MOVIEGUIDE® is unique in
gathering, Dr. Baehr prepares his "Report To The
Entertainment Industry," an insightful box office
analysis of the vast moral American audience. Information on
negative or positive content, Biblical or anti-Biblical
themes, increase or decrease of sex or violence, and over
twenty other indicators is carefully tabulated and compared
with box-office receipts for several years. Based on this
empirical data, Dr. Baehr has been able to prove to
Hollywood executives that the American public prefers
wholesome, worthwhile, moral movies, and it would benefit
these executives to support the production of more good
movies.
Along with the yearly "Report To The Entertainment
Industry," Dr. Baehr selects the ten best family
friendly and the ten best morally edifying mature audience
films of the year. Producers, directors, writers, and
distribution companies associated with these movies are
awarded plaques of recognition at an annual awards ceremony
in Hollywood. Dr. Baehr also presents the coveted $25,000
Epiphany Prizes for the Most Inspiring Movies and Television
Programs. These are cash prizes granted by the Templeton
Foundation for movies and television programs which help
people to know and understand God and His love.
By updating a guideline known as the Motion Picture and
Television Production Code, the organization has secured
support and signatures from more than one million
individuals. Now armed with more than fifty years of
statistical information, twenty years of research and
support from leaders in the entertainment industry, Dr.
Theodore Baehr is doing more than watching the world change
- - he is using the media to change the media.
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