Interspersed between the essays are short "on-the-street" interviews and "soap box" commentaries from such nationally known iconoclasts as newspaper columnist Molly Ivins, sixties-consciousness guru Timothy Leary, political commentator Jack Kemp, Cherokee Nation Chief Wilma Mankiller, and activist and educator Angela Davis, as well as from a waitress, plastic surgeon, and kids in a playground. The result is fast-paced, thought-provoking television that looks at the American Dream from perspectives ranging the entire breadth of our ideological and cultural spectrum.

DECLARATIONS is a sincere attempt to create a new kind of television -- television that allows people to speak to their fellow Americans about important issues without having their opinions filtered through editors who think they know better, or network executives wary of controversial programming. Each hour of Declarations offers an eclectic, engaging mix of ideas presented in a way that allows for as much diversity and depth as possible: two qualities that are extremely rare on television.

DECLARATIONS does contain some challenging criticisms of America, to be sure. In the FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION program, Pop historian James Bernard and rap artist Paris point to the recent L.A. riots as a consequence of suppressing the freedom to express anger, particularly the anger of young black Americans. In ALL MEN ARE CREATED EQUAL?, author and legal scholar Derrick Bell maintains that it is impossible to eradicate racism in America. To illustrate his point, he offers "The Fable of Equality's Child," a tale in which a child embodying the spirit of equality is perceived as a threat to the social fabric of the country.

The concept of equality also rings hollow to San Antonio education activist Demetrio Rodriguez. For the past two decades, Rodriguez has been fighting to give poor kids in San Antonio access to the same quality of education available to kids in the city's more affluent districts. Senior Producer Renee Tajima's "The Ballad of Demetrio Rodriguez" chronicles Rodriguez's grassroots struggle for education reform, but ends on a disquieting note: yet another election in which the people of San Antonio choose the status quo over equality in their school system.

While DECLARATIONS may be critical of America's occasional hypocrisies, the series also offers some timely suggestions on refocusing the energies of a country that has in many ways failed to live up to its own ideals.

In "Drawing the Line," radio commentator and writer Charles J. Sykes argues eloquently for restoring the lost values of responsibility, decency, honesty, respect, and shame. "Just because we have the right to do something, doesn't mean it's right to do it," says Sykes. Standing in a room draped in sheets to symbolically disguise its location, exiled author Salman Rushdie argues just as eloquently, albeit reluctantly, against the restrictive ideas of political correctness.

Though DECLARATIONS includes its share of celebrities, many of the program's participants are people whose opinions would not usually be featured on television. These voices demand that viewers reconsider commonly held notions and accepted stereotypes. This is especially true in the series program THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS, in which scavenger/writer Lars Eighner finds happiness by living as efficiently as possible. Eighner spends his days digging through dumpsters looking for usable goods that would otherwise wind up in a landfill, then writing about his experiences for various conservation journals. However, for a plastic surgeon and some of his patients, the pursuit of happiness means the freedom to have a nose job or a breast implant.

To ITVS, DECLARATIONS is more than just another innovative television program. It is also the first ITVS program for which an outside production company (Claypoint Productions) was directly commissioned to conceive and execute the project. Claypoint is best known for its documentaries The Power of Dreams, a limited series produced for the Discovery Channel, and A Time of AIDS. The company's experience in organizing multi-faceted projects involving a variety of participants was another important factor in the decision to hire Claypoint. Working together, ITVS and Claypoint refined the DECLARATIONS proposal, then Claypoint took command of the project.

The series came out much differently than first conceived, but in many cases that was an improvement," reports Claypoint Executive Producer Richard O'Regan. "I originally thought the issues themselves would be much smaller, but ITVS played a guiding hand in shaping the series into something that would address broad American ideals."

After agreeing on the basic concept for the series, O'Regan and his production team began brainstorming ideas and assigning teams of essayists and filmmakers to specific topics. Claypoint ultimately hired 16 independent filmmakers from all over the country and paired them with 14 equally independent-minded thinkers and a ninth grade class to collaborate on 10-minute essays. Each hour of the series was coordinated by a senior producer (David Liu, ReneeTajima, and Nigel Noble) who remained in contact with Claypoint throughout the production process.

According to O'Regan, selecting the essayists and the filmmakers and working out the scheduling was essentially a "Yenta process creating marriages that would be compatible, but not predictable." "Both the essayist and the filmmaker had to bring something unique and interesting to the subject. The chemistry between essayist and filmmaker is what makes each of the essays in DECLARATIONS special," says O'Regan. "In each of the essays, the essayist's point-of-view is the most obvious, of course. But each filmmaker has an individual voice in the segments as well."

For filmmaker Akili Buchanan, who worked with rap artist Paris and San Francisco pop historian James Bernard on "Disturbing the Peace," forming an effective collaboration was not a problem. "I've known James quite a while professionally," says Buchanan. "There was a flow between us. We both had the same intuitive sense of how to do the piece. We didn't even have to talk to each other about it very much." A similar spirit of mutual respect was essential for all of the collaborations. Though some pairings went more smoothly than others, reports from the field suggest that most were extremely successful both personally and professionally. "Working with Lourdes Portillo was a joy," says legal scholar Derrick Bell. "I was a little apprehensive at first because I've never done anything like this," he admits, "but it turned out to be a marvelous experience."

According to essayist Charles Sykes, he and filmmaker/Senior Producer David K. Liu found common ground almost immediately. "I'm not a maker, so I let David decide how to turn my essay into television. I'm sure the collaboration would have been less successful if the chemistry between David and me were different. But he had respect for my views and I was able to defer to him on filmmaking matters," says Sykes. "We worked together very well."

Though some filmmakers felt compromised because they did not have complete artistic control over the material in the essays, David Liu says that the artistic conflicts were minimal. "It was understood coming in that the filmmakers were responsible for visually realizing the essayist's point of view. As long as it was agreeable with the essayist, I think there was plenty of room for the filmmakers to approach the material in any way they wanted," says Liu. ITVS Interim Director of Production Kate Lehmann agrees: "We wanted shows in which filmmakers could use their own talents and aesthetics to assist the essayists in getting their points across," says Lehmann. In filming Derrick Bell's "Equality's Child," for example, filmmaker Lourdes Portillo incorporated many of the stylistic flourishes and techniques she developed in her most recent film, Columbus on Trial. "Portillo's distinctive visual treatment was extraordinarily innovative," says Lehmann, "and yet it maintained the tone of the story."

"DECLARATIONS is a bold experiment in a system that's been noted for its lack of boldness," Steve Rathe, ITVS's production representative in New York says, "and together, ITVS, Claypoint Productions, the independent producers, and the essayists have created something you don't see every day on television."