From PBS Previews

Auschwitz: Inside the Nazi State

AUSCHWITZ: INSIDE THE NAZI STATE, airing in conjunction with the 60th anniversary of the concentration camp's liberation, is a comprehensive look into the decisions that led to the creation of history's largest mass murder site. The programs air on PBS Wednesdays, January 19-February 2, 2005.

The series is narrated by actress Linda Hunt ("The Practice," The Year of Living Dangerously), with epilogues hosted by award-winning journalist Linda Ellerbee. It details with startling new clarity the process by which the concentration camp became the site of the largest mass murder in world history.

Written and produced by award-winning documentary filmmaker Laurence Rees ("Timewatch," "The Nazis: A Warning from History," "War of the Century," "Horror in the East"), the series creates a never-before-seen picture of Auschwitz based on Third Reich files, personal diaries and architectural plans made available only since the fall of East European communist regimes and the Soviet Union in the early 1990s. While never losing sight of the suffering of the victims, the documentary offers a unique and chilling look at the mindset of the perpetrators - killers like the Commandant of Auschwitz Rudolf Hoss, camp doctor Josef Mengele and S.S. Commander Heinrich Himmler.

Focusing on the mentality of the key decision-makers and those involved in the day-to-day operations of the camp, AUSCHWITZ: INSIDE THE NAZI STATE retells the history of Auschwitz from March 1940 through January 1945 through dramatizations based on original testimony and documents, interviews with perpetrators and survivors, archival footage and the use of computer-generated images to create detailed 3D models of the camp in its various stages of construction and expansion.

The series traces the evolution of Auschwitz from a place to terrorize the local Polish population and house Russian POWs to the largest extermination center in history, chronicling its rise as an industrial center and moneymaking machine for the Nazis, its vast web of corruption and the initiatives of individuals who claimed to be acting "under orders." It also seeks to provide insight into how the Nazis, who were by and large "normal," educated, patriotic Germans, rationalized and enabled the killing of more than 1.1 million people at Auschwitz. (By the fall of the Third Reich, the Nazis had murdered approximately 11,000,000 men, women and children throughout Europe on the basis of "race," of which some 6,000,000 were Jews).

In epilogues at the conclusion of the first five hours, Ellerbee interviews leading Holocaust and genocide scholars to discuss the contemporary relevance and implications of the material presented. In the sixth and final epilogue, Ellerbee speaks with eight students - three high school seniors and five college underclassmen - about what the series means for them and what they think young people can do to help prevent future genocide.

Writer and producer Laurence Rees has been described by The Times of London as "Britain's most distinguished producer of historical documentaries." Rees until recently served as editor of "Timewatch" (the BBC equivalent of AMERICAN EXPERIENCE), for which he won three Emmy Awards. Responsible for programs on a wide variety of historical subjects, he is best known for writing and producing three documentary series on World War II: "The Nazis: A Warning from History" (1997), which won eight international awards, including a BAFTA and a Peabody; "War of the Century" (1999), an examination of the Hitler/Stalin conflict; and "Horror in the East" (2000) about the war against Japan.

Additionally, Rees has written five history books to accompany his television work. The latest, Auschwitz; A New History (Public Affairs Books), will be available in January 2005.

Professor Sir Ian Kershaw, one of the world's most eminent scholars on the Third Reich, is the historical and script consultant for the series. Among the many other historical consultants who contributed to the program is Professor David Cesarani, of the University of Southampton, England, a former director of the world famous Wiener Library and a founder of Britain's first Holocaust museum.

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