John Dahl

Vice President and Executive Producer, Original Content, Films and Special Projects
John Dahl is a vice president and executive producer for Original Content, Films and Special Projects at ESPN. He oversees large, historically-based content initiatives, series and documentaries, including development and production. Most recently, Dahl was an Executive Producer on the Emmy-winning 10-part, 10-hour film series “The Last Dance” covering Michael Jordan’s final championship season with the Chicago Bulls.
Prior to “The Last Dance,” Dahl created and oversaw all aspects of ESPN’s College Football 150 initiative, featuring nearly 40 hours of original content based on the 150th anniversary of the sport. He is also an Executive Producer of the Peabody, Emmy and Academy Award-winning 30 for 30 series, a role he has served since its creation and the launch of ESPN Films in 2008. Additionally, he is a co-creator and Executive Producer of the investigative documentary series “Backstory” with Don Van Natta, Jr., and he’s the content lead for all college sports historical documentary programming, highlighted by the SEC Storied series and the 10-part/10-hour documentary “The Tournament: A History of ACC Basketball” that’s currently in production.
A winner of 3 Peabody Awards and 10 Emmys, Dahl has focused on documentary work and special projects throughout his career at ESPN. Prior to overseeing editorial content and production on ESPN Films documentaries including 30 for 30, he was a Producer for SportsCentury and the 50 Greatest Athletes series, before moving on to Executive Producer responsibilities for ESPN Classic and the ESPN25 project, a special on the 1958 NFL Championship Game, and anthology series highlighting Muhammad Ali, the history of NASCAR and the first 40 years of the Super Bowl.
Previously, Dahl was a Supervising Producer for CNN Sports and was ESPN’s first Chicago Bureau producer. He graduated with Honors from the University of North Carolina with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Radio, Television and Motion Pictures.
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