Natasha Lance Rogoff

Natasha Lance Rogoff is a TV producer, award-winning filmmaker and the bestselling author of the book, Muppets in Moscow: The Unexpected Crazy True Story of Making Sesame Street in Russia. Lance Rogoff has produced film and television programs for PBS, ABC and NBC News, as well as children’s digital content. As the executive producer of Ulitsa Sezam, (Sesame Street in Russia), Lance Rogoff led a team of Moscow artists from 1992-1997, and also produced Plaza Sesamo (Sesame Street in Mexico). Muppets in Moscow offers a gripping account of bringing the Muppets to 1990s Russia, just after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Lance Rogoff and her team faced bombings, the assassinations of her broadcast partners and the takeover of the puppet production office. The Wall Street Journal praises Muppets in Moscow as “Sparkling” - The Guardian as “Highly Entertaining” and Forbes as “Inspiring.” Muppets in Moscow is shortlisted for the prestigious 2023 Pushkin House Book Prize, for Best Nonfiction Writing on Russia. Lance Rogoff is also a journalist. After moving to Russia in 1982 to study Russian language at Leningrad State University, she published articles in major Western press and produced TV programs about Soviet underground culture, including the persecution of Russian rock musicians (ABC’s 20/20 Rock Around the Kremlin episode in 1985), and the LGBTQ community (Gay Life Under the Hammer & Sickle, in The San Francisco Chronicle.) During the 1988 Reagan-Gorbachev Moscow Summit, Natasha served as Special Consultant to NBC Nightly News with Tom Brokaw, and in 1989, joined Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Hedrick Smith to produce the four-part PBS television series, Inside Gorbachev’s USSR, which received a Dupont Columbia Award. More recently, Lance Rogoff produced, wrote and directed, Russian Millennials Speak Openly About America, a short 2017 film available on YouTube with several million views. Lance Rogoff made documentary films from 1985-1991. After embedding herself with hardline Russian nationalists, she wrote, produced and directed the award-winning film, Russia for Sale: The Rough Road to Capitalism, which aired nationally on PBS and, was also featured on ABC’s Nightline with Ted Koppel on the night the Soviet empire fell. Muppets in Moscow was nominated for the prestigious 2023 Pushkin Book Prize Award for best nonfiction writing on Russia and is the recipient of awards from The Benjamin Franklin Independent Book Publishers Association (IBPA) - Best New Voice-Silver Medal and Best Audiobook in Nonfiction-Silver Medal, as well as the Best First Book-Gold Medal from the Independent Publishers Book Awards. Lance Rogoff is currently an Associate in the Art, Film and Visual Studies Department at Harvard University and