Directors Guild of America Award for Outstanding Directing – Documentaries

The Directors Guild of America Award for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Documentaries is one of the annual Directors Guild of America Awards given by the Directors Guild of America. It was first awarded at the 44th Directors Guild of America Awards in 1992.

Directors Guild of America Award for Outstanding Directing – Documentaries
The 2024 recipients: Brendan Bellomo and Slava Leontyev
Awarded for	Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Documentaries
Country	United States
Presented by	Directors Guild of America
First award	1991
Currently held by	Brendan Bellomo and Slava Leontyev for Porcelain War (2024)
Website	https://www.dga.org

Ari Folman's Waltz with Bashir remains the only animated film to ever won a DGA award.

Winners and nominees

1990s

Year	Winners and nominees	Film	Ref.
1991 (44th)	Barbara Kopple	American Dream	[1]
	Eleanor Coppola, Fax Bahr, and George Hickenlooper	Hearts of Darkness: A Filmmaker's Apocalypse
	Albert Maysles, Bob Eisenhardt, Susan Froemke, and Peter Gelb	Soldiers of Music: Rostropovich Returns to Russia
	Alan Raymond	Doing Time: Life Inside the Big House
1992 (45th)	Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky	Brother's Keeper	[2]
	Ric Burns	The Donner Party
	Mark Stouffer	Braving Alaska
1993 (46th)	Barbara Kopple	Fallen Champ: The Untold Story of Mike Tyson	[3]
	Shari Cookson	Skinheads USA: Soldiers of the Race War
	Bruce Kuerten and John DiJulio	From Fields of Promise
	Susan Raymond	I Am a Promise: The Children of Stanton Elementary School
	Susan Steinberg	American Masters for "Paul Simon: Born at the Right Time"
1994 (47th)	Steve James	Hoop Dreams	[4]
	Dan Geller and Dayna Goldfine	Frosh: Nine Months in a Freshman Dorm
	Jyll Johnstone	Martha & Ethel
	Susan Todd and Andrew Young	Lives in Hazard
	Bethany Yarrow	Mama Awethu!
1995 (48th)	Terry Zwigoff	Crumb	[5]
	Deborah Hoffmann	Complaints of a Dutiful Daughter
	Freida Lee Mock	Maya Lin: A Strong Clear Vision
	Bill Van Daalen	Indianapolis: Ship of Doom
	Helen Whitney	American Masters for "Richard Avedon: Darkness and Light"
1996 (49th)	Al Pacino	Looking for Richard	[6]
	Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky	Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills
	Leon Gast	When We Were Kings
	Jeanne Jordan and Steven Ascher	Troublesome Creek: A Midwestern
	Isaac Mizrahi	The Great War and the Shaping of the 20th Century for "Slaughter"
1997 (50th)	Michael Uys and Lexy Lovell	Riding the Rails	[7]
	Ellen Hovde and Muffie Meyer	Liberty! The American Revolution for "Blows Must Decide"
	John O'Hagan	Wonderland
	Michèle Ohayon	Colors Straight Up
	Peter Rosen	First Person Singular: I.M. Pei
1998 (51st)	Jerry Blumenthal, Peter Gilbert and Gordon Quinn	Vietnam, Long Time Coming	[8]
	Matthew Diamond	Dancemaker
	Susan Lacy	American Masters for "Leonard Bernstein: Reaching for the Note"
	Nigel Noble	Great Performances for "Porgy and Bess: An American Voice"
	Kyra Thompson	Dying to Tell the Story
1999 (52nd)	Nanette Burstein and Brett Morgen	On the Ropes	[9]
	Barry W. Blaustein	Beyond the Mat
	Marc Levin	Thug Life in D.C.
	Errol Morris	Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr.
	Gary Weimberg	The Double Life of Ernesto Gomez-Gomez

2000s

Year	Winners and nominees	Film	Ref.
2000 (53rd)	Charles Braverman	High School Boot Camp	[10]
	Laurie Collyer	Nuyorican Dream
	Mark Lewis	The Natural History of the Chicken
	Michael Mierendorf	Broken Child
	David de Vries	The True Story of the Bridge on the River Kwai
2001 (54th)	Chris Hegedus and Jehane Noujaim	Startup.com	[11]
	Charles Braverman	Rocky and Rolanda
	Stephen Ives	Amato: A Love Affair with Opera
	Frances Reid and Deborah Hoffmann	Long Night's Journey Into Day
	Martin J. Spinelli	Life on Jupiter: The Story of Jens Nygaard, Musician
2002 (55th)	Tasha Oldham	The Smith Family	[12]
	Charles Braverman	Bottom of the Ninth
	Rebecca Cammisa and Rob Fruchtman	Sister Helen
	Malcolm Clarke and Stuart Sender	Prisoner of Paradise
	Leah Mahan	Sweet Old Song
2003 (56th)	Nathaniel Kahn	My Architect	[13]
	Sam Green and Bill Siegel	The Weather Underground
	Andrew Jarecki	Capturing the Friedmans
	Errol Morris	The Fog of War
	José Padilha	Bus 174
2004 (57th)	Byambasuren Davaa and Luigi Falorni	The Story of the Weeping Camel	[14]
	Zana Briski and Ross Kauffman	Born into Brothels
	Ross McElwee	Bright Leaves
	Michael Moore	Fahrenheit 9/11
	Jehane Noujaim	Control Room
2005 (58th)	Werner Herzog	Grizzly Man	[15]
	Kief Davidson and Richard Ladkani	The Devil's Miner
	Sean McAllister	The Liberace of Baghdad
	Rupert Murray	Unknown White Male
	Brent Renaud and Craig Renaud	Off to War: Welcome to Baghdad
2006 (59th)	Arūnas Matelis	Before Flying Back to Earth	[16]
	Amy J. Berg	Deliver Us from Evil
	Michael Glawogger	Workingman's Death
	James Longley	Iraq in Fragments
	Jean-Henri Meunier	Ici Najac, A Vous La Terre
2007 (60th)	Asger Leth	Ghosts of Cité Soleil	[17]
	Ken Burns and Lynn Novick	The War
	Alex Gibney	Taxi to the Dark Side
	Richard E. Robbins	Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience
	Barbet Schroeder	Terror's Advocate
2008 (61st)	Ari Folman	Waltz with Bashir	[18]
	Peter Gilbert and Steve James	At the Death House Door
	Elizabeth Farnsworth and Patricio Lanfranco	The Judge and the General
	James Marsh	Man on Wire
	Gonzalo Arijón	Stranded: I've Come from a Plane that Crashed in the Mountains
2009 (62nd)	Louie Psihoyos	The Cove	[19]
	Sacha Gervasi	Anvil! The Story of Anvil
	Mai Iskander	Garbage Dreams
	Robert Kenner	Food, Inc.
	Geoffrey Smith	The English Surgeon
	Agnès Varda	The Beaches of Agnès

2010s

Year	Winners and nominees	Film	Ref.
2010 (63rd)	Charles Ferguson	Inside Job	[20]
	Lixin Fan	Last Train Home
	Alex Gibney	Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer
	Davis Guggenheim	Waiting for "Superman"
	Tim Hetherington and Sebastian Junger	Restrepo
2011 (64th)	James Marsh	Project Nim	[21]
	Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky	Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory
	Steve James	The Interrupters
	Richard Press	Bill Cunningham New York
	Martin Scorsese	George Harrison: Living in the Material World
2012 (65th)	Malik Bendjelloul	Searching for Sugar Man	[22]
	Kirby Dick	The Invisible War
	David France	How to Survive a Plague
	Lauren Greenfield	The Queen of Versailles
	Alison Klayman	Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry
2013 (66th)	Jehane Noujaim	The Square	[23]
	Zachary Heinzerling	Cutie and the Boxer
	Joshua Oppenheimer	The Act of Killing
	Sarah Polley	Stories We Tell
	Lucy Walker	The Crash Reel
2014 (67th)	Laura Poitras	Citizenfour	[24]
	Dan Krauss	The Kill Team
	John Maloof and Charlie Siskel	Finding Vivian Maier
	Jesse Moss	The Overnighters
	Orlando von Einsiedel	Virunga
2015 (68th)	Matthew Heineman	Cartel Land	[25][26]
	Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi	Meru
	Liz Garbus	What Happened, Miss Simone?
	Alex Gibney	Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief
	Asif Kapadia	Amy
2016 (69th)	Ezra Edelman	O.J.: Made in America	[27][28]
	Otto Bell	The Eagle Huntress
	Josh Kriegman and Elyse Steinberg	Weiner
	Raoul Peck	I Am Not Your Negro
	Roger Ross Williams	Life, Animated
2017 (70th)	Matthew Heineman	City of Ghosts	[29]
	Ken Burns and Lynn Novick	The Vietnam War
	Bryan Fogel	Icarus
	Steve James	Abacus: Small Enough to Jail
	Errol Morris	Wormwood
2018 (71st)	Tim Wardle	Three Identical Strangers	[30][31][32]
	Morgan Neville	Won't You Be My Neighbor?
	RaMell Ross	Hale County This Morning, This Evening
	Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin	Free Solo
	Betsy West and Julie Cohen	RBG
2019 (72nd)	Steven Bognar and Julia Reichert	American Factory	[33][34][35]
	Feras Fayyad	The Cave
	Alex Holmes	Maiden
	Ljubomir Stefanov and Tamara Kotevska	Honeyland
	Nanfu Wang and Jialing Zhang	One Child Nation

2020s

Year	Winners and nominees	Film	Ref.
2020 (73rd)	Michael Dweck & Gregory Kershaw	The Truffle Hunters	[36][37]
	Pippa Ehrlich & James Reed	My Octopus Teacher
	David France	Welcome to Chechnya
	Amanda McBaine & Jesse Moss	Boys State
	Benjamin Ree	The Painter and the Thief
2021 (74th)	Stanley Nelson Jr.	Attica	[38][39]
	Jessica Kingdon	Ascension
	Raoul Peck	Exterminate All the Brutes
	Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson	Summer of Soul (...Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised)
	Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi and Jimmy Chin	The Rescue
2022 (75th)	Sara Dosa	Fire of Love	[40][41]
	Matthew Heineman	Retrograde
	Laura Poitras	All the Beauty and the Bloodshed
	Daniel Roher	Navalny
	Shaunak Sen	All That Breathes
2023 (76th)	Mstyslav Chernov	20 Days in Mariupol	[42][43]
	Moses Bwayo and Christopher Sharp	Bobi Wine: The People's President
	Madeleine Gavin	Beyond Utopia
	Davis Guggenheim	Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie
	D. Smith	Kokomo City
2024 (77th)	Brendan Bellomo and Slava Leontyev	Porcelain War	[44][45][46]
	Julian Brave NoiseCat and Emily Kassie	Sugarcane
	Johan Grimonprez	Soundtrack to a Coup d'Etat
	Ibrahim Nash'at	Hollywoodgate
	Natalie Rae and Angela Patton	Daughters

Multiple wins and nominations

Wins	Nominations	Name (Year)
2	3	Matthew Heineman (2015, 2017, 2022)
	3	Jehane Noujaim (2001, 2004, 2013)
	2	Barbara Kopple (1991, 1993)
1	4	Steve James (1994, 2008, 2011, 2017)
	3	Joe Berlinger (1992, 2006, 2011)
	3	Bruce Sinofsky (1992, 2006, 2011)
	3	Charles Braverman (2000, 2001, 2002)
	2	Peter Gilbert (1998, 2008)
	2	James Marsh (2008, 2011)
	2	Laura Poitras (2014, 2022)
0	3	Errol Morris (1999, 2003, 2017)
	3	Alex Gibney (2007, 2010, 2015)
	3	Jimmy Chin (2015, 2018, 2021)
	3	Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi (2015, 2018, 2021)
	2	Deborah Hoffmann (1995, 2001)
	2	Ken Burns (2007, 2017)
	2	Lynn Novick (2007, 2017)
	2	Davis Guggenheim (2010, 2023)
	2	David France (2012, 2020)
	2	Jesse Moss (2014, 2020)
	2	Raoul Peck (2016, 2021)

See also

• Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature