David Freid is an award-winning filmmaker and journalist who has contributed to National Geographic, NBC, The New York Times, Vanity Fair, The Atlantic, and VICE, among others. David recently ran MEL Films – filming in more than 40 countries and finding unexpected humor in unexpected places.

Since releasing his first film in early 2016, David has directed 50 short, premium, news and lifestyle documentaries, including the 2019 Emmy-nominated Guns Found Here. Prior to that, he won the IDA Documentary Award for Best Short Form Series, beating big dogs like The New York Times, The Guardian, VICE & HBO. He has partnered on television programming with National Geographic and contributed to NBC. The films have appeared on BuzzFeed, Slate, Washington Post, Today Show, and twenty-two of them have run on The Atlantic. They have received ten Staff Picks on Vimeo, and have had twenty different films run and win at festivals around the world, including SXSW, Palm Springs, DOC NYC, Tribeca and The American Pavilion at Cannes. He has won two Webby Honorees, has been nominated by Webby for best documentary film of the year, nominated for a Streamy, and won an Edward R. Murrow Award for Journalism.

David’s recent spots highlight families’ quirky relatable moments and an essence of freedom for Sonic Drive-In’s re-brand and bring the heat to hot flashes asking “What’s VMS?” in the Super Bowl ad for Astellas.

Currently in various stages of development and production for brands, series and films, David’s recent work includes Hungry for Answers, the docu-series exploring big themes of race and food in America for Discovery in partnership with Food Network, the Peacock Original docu-series True Colors capturing intimate and vivid portraits of Hispanic trailblazers including baseball superstar Alex Rodriguez, Olympian Laurie Hernandez, and activist and US Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a new half-hour docu-series called ANTHOLOGY, and a feature film version of one of his favorite MEL Films subjects.