Right to Play

Were his Olympic speed-skating gold medals in 1994 his only legacy, Norwegian Johann Olav Koss might have just become another athlete living off dusty accomplishments. Instead, Koss used the same singular determination and focus that took him to the top of his sport to make a difference in the lives of some of the planet’s most vulnerable and victimized children. Recognizing that sport has mobilizing power, and seeing opportunity where others might have seen only obstacles, Koss gave up a career in medicine for the challenges of international aid and development and created a global organization called Right to Play. This feel-good documentary of the same name directed by part-time Tellurider Frank Marshall (one of the most accomplished producers in Hollywood) captures Koss’s guiding principle that all children have the right to play, and his legacy now, far from obscure, extends to some 700,000 children in 23 countries.