The New Yorker: The delight of “Drop Dead City” is that it’s a symphony of voices, past and present. The film’s interviews mesh, even rhyme, with archival clips documenting events as they unfolded, participants discussing their activities in the moment, and news reports that aired at the time. 

Variety: “Drop Dead City” falls into a category of documentary I think of as wonkish but gripping. Produced and directed by Peter Yost and Michael Rohatyn, the film is about the financial cataclysm that hit New York City in 1975, when the powers that be figured out that the city was $6 billion in debt.

NY Times: A documentary about the city’s fiscal crisis of the 1970s, co-directed by the son of one of its saviors, wins the Library of Congress Lavine/Ken Burns Prize for Film.

New York, NY – March 19, 2025 – DROP DEAD CITY, a gripping new documentary about New York City’s 1975 fiscal crisis, that explores what life was like in the country’s largest city in the turbulent 1970s, is set to be released theatrically at New York’s IFC Center on Friday, April 25, 2025, the film’s directors announced today. 

Cinema Daily: Who knew that a film about accountants, bureaucrats, and municipal bond offerings could ever be interesting, let alone downright enjoyable? After all, hasn’t economics often been referred to as the “dismal science”?

Listen to interview with Alison Stewart, All of It Podcast on WNYC

DOC NYC names DROP DEAD CITY 2024 | Special Mention: Audience Award Runners-Up

DOC NYC today unveiled its main slate for the 15^th anniversary of America’s biggest documentary festival, a lineup that includes 31 world premieres and 24 U.S. premieres.

Co-directors of a documentary of the era, Peter Yost and Michael Rohatyn, discusses the crisis leading to the nation's movement away from social and deficit spending.

The Better Angels Society and the New-York Historical Society are pleased to share an exclusive inside look at a new documentary film, DROP DEAD CITY: NEW YORK ON THE BRINK IN 1975, by Michael Rohatyn and Peter Yost, winner of the 2023 Library of Congress Lavine/Ken Burns Prize for Film.

The Library of Congress Lavine/Ken Burns Prize for Film is an annual national prize that provides recognition and resources for exemplary documentary films that tell compelling stories about American history.

The agony of the subways also has more than a few New Yorkers worrying that they’ve begun an inexorable descent, maybe even back to the 1970s, when the city endured what could reasonably be described as a near-death experience.