And we were there, as I hoped, for every twist and turn in what became a stunning, thrilling, unprecedented two-year run of mind-bending discovery.

Everyone had told me it would be “a year or two” before the detection would be made.  But not long after I interviewed Thorne, we were at the LIGO Livingston Observatory outside of Baton 

Rouge, in great good fortune, on the day the historic signal came in. The waveform was a remnant and messenger from the first detected cataclysmic collision of two black holes.  Almost everyone at LIGO around the world was taken by complete surprise.

We filmed as they kept the detection secret for another tense and emotional four months, until all doubts were dispelled and their discovery paper was accepted for publication.  We continued through 2016, 2017 and the equally stunning detection of two colliding neutron stars, which ignited a gamma ray burst-kilonova light show that became the most observed cosmic event in history. Telescopes and satellite-based cameras around the world turned in a matter of minutes to catch it.  I raced to CERN ten days later, where LIGO was holding its semi-annual meeting.  The air was electric with discovery.

That fall, our three principal characters, Thorne; Rai Weiss, who spent 50 years perfecting the exquisite sensitivity of the detectors; and Barry Barish, who “saved” LIGO from warring factions and built the two detectors; won the Nobel Prize in Physics.  Our last shoot was a magic, icy December week in Stockholm with them.

"I don't think I have ever seen a better presentation of how science is done.”

   -- Rai Weiss, Nobel Prize winning creator of LIGO.

“This discovery is the kind of achievement that happens only a few times a century.“

-- Brian Greene, theoretical physicist and best-selling author.  

"I really appreciate you highlighting all these female scientists and the work they've been doing. Their passion was electrifying!”

--  Stavroula Toska, screenwriter, director, producer.

OTHER "LIGO" REVIEWS

Four years and a Nobel Prize later, NATIONAL

list of the “Top 20 Scientific Discoveries of the 

Decade,” and it is seriously compared with 

Galileo’s invention of the telescope in opening 

up a new way of viewing the universe.  

In writing and editing the documentary, I knew 

we had filmed a once-in-a-lifetime inside story 

into one of the most profound achievements of

the human mind:  The theory, general relativity, 

going back 100 years to Einstein and several 

decades to Hawking and so many others; 

Weiss’s vision and ingenious perfecting of an

instrument that could detect a wave of warped 

space the size of one atom in the distance between 

the earth and the sun.  And the data analysis, which, 

after a decades-long quest, could “read” that signal

from an unknown, surprise event, and tell us it was

the collision of two black holes 1.4 billion years 

ago, one black hole 35 times more massive than 

the sun and the other 30 times more massive, a 

collison that released in less than two-tenths of 

a second an amount of energy equal to three 

suns exploding.

"LIGO" also is the story of a relentless 

search for truth, which I hoped would resonate. 

And they were rebel scientists all, great 

characters, because this was a sketchy corner of 

physics, one laced with false claims over the 

years, controversial up until the moment the 

detection came in.  I chose to take the 

audience deep into their world for 90 

minutes,  and what a cool, affirming world 

it is.  And mind bending, if not terrifying, 

as they witnessed for the first time the 

violent, warped side of the universe.