Burt Kearns

Last updated
Burt Kearns
Alma materFairfield University
Occupations
  • author
  • writer
  • film director
  • journalist
  • television and film producer

Burt Kearns is an American author, journalist, and television and film producer, writer and director, whom Donald Liebenson of Vanity Fair referred to as a "show business and pop culture savant." [1]

Contents

Kearns's first book, the television memoir Tabloid Baby , was published in 1999. [2] The Show Won't Go On: The Most Shocking, Bizarre, and Historic Deaths of Performers Onstage, which he wrote with Jeff Abraham, was published in 2019. [3] His biography of actor Lawrence Tierney, [4] Lawrence Tierney: Hollywood's Real-Life Tough Guy , was published in December, 2022 by the University Press of Kentucky. [5] [6] Applause Theatre & Cinema Books published Kearns’ book, Marlon Brando: Hollywood Rebel , [7] [8] on April 2, 2024. [9] Kearns's book, Shemp! The Biography of the Three Stooges' Shemp Howard, The Face of Film Comedy, was published on October 1, 2024, also by Applause. [10] [11]

In 2018, he became a contributor to the literary pop culture website, PleaseKillMe.com. [12] In December 2021, he began to contribute written and video pieces to Legs McNeil’s literary pop culture website, Legsville.com. [13]

Early career

After graduation from Fairfield University in 1978, [14] Kearns worked as a reporter and editor for the Acorn Press, a chain of newspapers in southern Connecticut and Westchester, New York. He moved to Manhattan, where he was hired on the assignment desk at WNEW-TV's 10 O'Clock News. Kearns also wrote for CBS News' Nightwatch and CBS Morning News . In October 1983, he joined WNBC-TV’s News 4 New York team as a newswriter and producer of the eleven o’clock newscast. [15] While at NBC, he freelanced as a writer for Spin magazine. [16] [17] [18]

Kearns joined the show A Current Affair in 1989. [19] Kearns also worked on to the rival show Hard Copy , as managing editor and producer. [20] In 1994, he was senior producer of Premier Story. [21] Kearns (and his coverage of the fall of the Berlin Wall) was included in Maury Povich's 1991 memoir, Current Affairs: A Life on the Edge. [22]

Kearns left tabloid television and began writing Tabloid Baby in 1996. A combination memoir and exposé, the book was published in November 1999 by Hambleton-Hill's Celebrity Books imprint. [19]

Television and film production

Writer and producer

He appeared on-camera in the Reelz nonfiction special program, Kardashian: The Man Who Saved OJ Simpson. [23] He was executive producer of the Reelz nonfiction special El Chapo & Sean Penn: Bungle In The Jungle. [24] Kearns was also director, writer and executive producer of Hollywood Animal Crusaders for Animal Planet [25] and co-producer of the HBO documentary Panic. [26] He was producer of the Fox Television special, When Good Pets Go Bad 2, [27] and executive producer and showrunner of series including the syndicated Strange Universe . [28] and Conspiracy Theory with Jesse Ventura . [29] He was a creator and executive producer of Breaking the Ice, a docuseries following the first diverse, competitive synchronized ice skating team. [30] [31] The series premiered on WE tv in 2023 and streams on AMC's ALLBLK platform. [32] Kearns cowrote, produced and edited the 2025 nonfiction film, Pusherman: Frank Lucas and the True Story of American Gangster, [33] [34] directed by Legs McNeil.

Independent features and Good Story Productions

Kearns directed the nonfiction film, El Viaje Musical de Ezekiel Montanez: The Chris Montez Story, which opened on August 15, 2009 at the 35th annual The Fest For Beatles Fans in Chicago. [35] Kearns produced the nonfiction film comedy High There . [36] [37] High There and the Montez film were produced through his Good Story Productions production company. [38]

Frozen Pictures

In 2000, Kearns formed the production company Frozen Television (later Frozen Pictures) with producer Brett Hudson. [39] Kearns was an executive producer on All the Presidents' Movies for Bravo [40] [41] and The Secret History of Rock ’n’ Roll with Gene Simmons [42] and Adults Only: The Secret History of The Other Hollywood for Court TV. [43]

With Hudson and Albert S. Ruddy, Kearns wrote and produced the 2006 Twentieth Century-Fox film, Cloud 9 , [44] starring Burt Reynolds, which was a joint production of Frozen and The Ruddy Morgan Organization. [45]

The Seventh Python movie poster.jpg

He directed and produced the 2008 documentary musical film, The Seventh Python , about the career and influence of Monty Python collaborator and Bonzo Dog Band member Neil Innes, [46] and directed and produced Basketball Man, the 2007 Frozen Pictures documentary film that featured interviews telling the story of the game's inventor, James Naismith. [47] [ non-primary source needed ] [48] The film was released on DVD on May 8, 2007. [48]

Kearns founded the website, Saintmychal.com, that chronicled and promoted the canonization of 9/11 victim Mychal Judge. [49] [50] [51]

Awards

References

  1. ↑ Liebenson, Donald (4 September 2019). "Killer Set: The Strange History of Performers Dying Onstage". Vanity Fair .
  2. ↑ Tabloidbaby (2010-12-19). "tabloid baby: Buy, bye". tabloid baby. Retrieved 2016-04-09.[ non-primary source needed ]
  3. ↑ "'Show Won't Go On': Book Compiles Performers Who Died Onstage". NPR.org.
  4. ↑ "Home". lawrencetierneybook.com.
  5. ↑ "Book About Late Actor and Notorious Bad Guy Lawrence Tierney Set from Writer-Producer Burt Kearns". The Hollywood Reporter . 9 June 2021.
  6. ↑ "Lawrence Tierney Bio Etches Vivid Portrait of Hollywood's Real-Life Tough Guy | Features | Roger Ebert". 27 November 2022.
  7. ↑ Vognar, Chris (2024-03-27). "The photo that wrapped Marlon Brando's homoerotic swagger in a tight leather jacket". Los Angeles Times . Retrieved 2024-04-18.
  8. ↑ "Marlon Brando: Hollywood Rebel =March 29, 2024". Library Journal. Archived from the original on April 18, 2024. Retrieved April 18, 2024.
  9. ↑ Marlon Brando: Hollywood Rebel. Archived from the original on 19 May 2024. Retrieved 30 September 2023– via rowman.com.
  10. ↑ Shemp! The Biography of the Three Stooges' Shemp Howard, The Face of Film Comedy . Retrieved 4 February 2024– via rowman.com.
  11. ↑ "A neglected Marx Brother and an unsung Stooge finally get their due =October 18, 2024". The Washington Post.
  12. ↑ "Search for "burt kearns"". PleaseKillMe. 28 March 2018.
  13. ↑ "You searched for burt kearns".
  14. ↑ "Burt Kearns: Tabloid TV Revolution" (PDF). www.fairfield.edu. Archived from the original (PDF) on 6 March 2018. Retrieved 15 January 2022.
  15. ↑ https://goodstorynews.blogspot.com/2014/09/emmy-anniversary.html Emmy award as newswriter.
  16. ↑ SPIN. SPIN Media LLC. 1988-09-01.
  17. ↑ SPIN. SPIN Media LLC. 1988-11-01.[ non-primary source needed ]
  18. ↑ SPIN. SPIN Media LLC. 1989-03-01.[ non-primary source needed ]
  19. 1 2 Elder, Sean (1999-12-08). "Tabloid nation". www.salon.com. Archived from the original on 2 March 2000. Retrieved 15 January 2022.
  20. ↑ Rader, Peter (2012-04-13). Mike Wallace: A Life. Macmillan. p. 239. ISBN   9781466802254.
  21. ↑ "Burt Kearns". www.lukeford.net. Retrieved 2016-04-09.[ self-published source ]
  22. ↑ Povich, Maury (1992-01-01). Current Affairs: A Life on the Edge. Berkley Books. ISBN   9780425132449.
  23. ↑ Sorokach, Josh (June 12, 2017). "Did You Know There's A New O.J. Simpson Documentary On Netflix?". Decider.com.
  24. ↑ Galloway, Stephen (9 March 2016). "The Strange, Ongoing Saga of Sean Penn, el Chapo and Who Was (And Wasn't) Making a Movie". The Hollywood Reporter .
  25. ↑ "Burt Kearns". Archived from the original on May 18, 2021.
  26. ↑ "Bad Boy TV".
  27. ↑ "Steve Dunleavy and the Rise of Tabloid TV". The New York Observer . 6 December 1999.
  28. ↑ https://www.coasttocoastam.com/guest/kearns-burt-6018/ Executive Producer of Strange Universe is Art Bell's guest
  29. ↑ https://variety.com/2009/tv/reviews/conspiracy-theory-with-jesse-ventura-1200477236/
  30. ↑ Grodeska, J. F. (25 July 2023). "Groundbreaking Docuseries With Jersey Shore Roots". Jersey Shore Scene. Retrieved 30 September 2023.
  31. ↑ Pendleton, Tonya (2023-04-28). "'Breaking the Ice' docuseries on diverse ice skating team comes to We TV in July". UPI. Retrieved 30 September 2023.
  32. ↑ "Breaking News - WE tv Greenlights Ice Skating Docuseries "Breaking the Ice"". thefutoncritic.com via press release from AMC Networks. 2023-04-27. Retrieved 30 September 2023.
  33. ↑ "DVD Review: Pusherman – Frank Lucas & the True Story of American Gangster". 26 June 2025.
  34. ↑ Moseley, Eunice (2025-07-09). "The Pulse of Entertainment: Legs McNeil Releases 'Pusherman: Frank Lucas and The True Story of American Gangsta'". EURweb. Retrieved 2025-08-06.
  35. ↑ Tabloidbaby (2009-08-16). "tabloid baby: The more they saw Chris Montez at the Fest for Beatles Fans in Chicago, the more they wanted to call him". tabloid baby. Retrieved 2016-04-09.[ non-primary source needed ]
  36. ↑ Diaz, Dave. "High There". Anchorage Press. Archived from the original on 2016-02-10. Retrieved 2016-04-09.
  37. ↑ "An Interview with Burt Kearns, Producer - High There - The Documentary Dude". The Documentary Dude. Archived from the original on 2016-03-04. Retrieved 2016-04-09.
  38. ↑ "Welcome". Good Story Productions. Archived from the original on 2016-04-01. Retrieved 2016-04-09.
  39. ↑ "Frozen Pictures to Bring Beach Volley-Ball to the Small Screen". 28 September 2004.
  40. ↑ Kumar, Martha Joynt (2007). "A Review of: "All the Presidents' Movies, executive producers, Bill Knoedelseder, Burt Kearns, Brett Hudson, and Irv Letofsky"" . Political Communication. 24: 99–104. doi:10.1080/10584600600977102. S2CID   146325033.
  41. ↑ "Secrets of the Now-Demolished White House Movie Theater - New York magazine".
  42. ↑ "Unmasked Gene Simmons Lifts Curtain on Rock". ABC News .
  43. ↑ "Adults Only: The Secret History of the Other Hollywood (2001) - Cast & Crew on MUBI".
  44. ↑ "May 25, 2004, page 22 - Kenosha News at Newspapers.com™". Newspapers.com.
  45. ↑ "Bibliograph".
  46. ↑ "LAist Movie Review: The Seventh Python". 27 June 2008.
  47. ↑ goodstory (2006-10-30), Red Auerbach's last interview (from 'Basketball Man'), archived from the original on 2021-12-13, retrieved 2016-04-09
  48. 1 2 "Basketball Man - Movie".
  49. ↑ "Ocala Star-Banner - Google News Archive Search". news.google.com. Retrieved 2016-04-09.
  50. ↑ Wakin, Daniel J. (2002-09-27). "Killed on 9/11, Fire Chaplain Becomes Larger Than Life". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2016-04-09.
  51. ↑ "The making of St. Mychal". USA Today. Retrieved 2016-04-09.
  52. ↑ Team, The Good Story (September 24, 2014). "Good Story News: Emmy anniversary".
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