Howard A. Rodman | |
---|---|
Occupations |
|
Known for | Savage Grace August Joe Gould's Secret Destiny Express The Great Eastern |
Spouse(s) | Anne Friedberg (m. 1990, died 2009) Mary Beth Heffernan (m. 2017) |
Howard A. Rodman is a screenwriter, author and professor. He is the former President of the Writers Guild of America, West, professor and former chair of the writing division at the USC School of Cinematic Arts, [1] alumnus of Telluride Association Summer Program [2] and an artistic director of the Sundance Institute Screenwriting Labs. [3]
He is the son of screenwriter Howard Rodman (1920–1985).
In his 20s and early 30s, Rodman was a typist, a legal proofreader, a mail-room clerk, a union organizer (for the Committee of Interns and Residents) and the guitarist for various lower-Manhattan post-punk bands (Made in USA, Arsenal, Soul Sharks). [4] [5] Starting as editor-in-chief of The Cornell Daily Sun , [6] Rodman has published scores of articles in venues including The New York Times, [7] The Los Angeles Times, [8] Los Angeles Magazine, [9] and the Village Voice (for which he was a monthly columnist). [10]
His adaptations of Jim Thompson, David Goodis et al. for Showtime's Fallen Angels anthology series [11] were directed by Steven Soderbergh and Tom Cruise. The screenplays were published in Fallen Angels: Six Noir Tales Told for Television. [12] Rodman then wrote Joe Gould's Secret , which opened the 2000 Sundance festival and was subsequently released by October/USA Films. [13] Rodman's original screenplay F. was selected by Premiere Magazine as one of Hollywood's Ten Best Unproduced Screenplays. [14] Other films include Savage Grace , starring Julianne Moore, and August , with Josh Hartnett, Rip Torn, and David Bowie—both of which had their US premieres at the 2008 Sundance Film Festival. [15] They were released in 2008 from IFC and First Look, respectively. Rodman's screenplay for Savage Grace was nominated for a Spirit Award in the Best Screenplay category. [16]
Destiny Express was published in January 1990 by Atheneum Books. [17] It was blurbed by Thomas Pynchon, who called it "Daringly imagined and darkly romantic — a moral thriller." [18] [19]
Destiny Express is an historical romance. Set in Berlin in March 1933, it explores the stark choices faced by the German filmmaking community – chief among them legendary director Fritz Lang ( M ; Metropolis ), and his acclaimed wife and collaborator, Thea von Harbou. Lang was famously offered the position of head of the Reich's film industry by Joseph Goebbels, and fled on the next train to Paris; von Harbou stayed, and made films for the Nazis. Destiny Express is thus the story of the end of a marriage, set in one of history's most crucial junctures. Other historical figures – Bertolt Brecht, Billy Wilder among them – play significant roles in the novel's intertwined narratives. [20]
The novel The Great Eastern by Howard A. Rodman was published [21] on June 4, 2019, by Melville House Publishing. In 2020, actor Keegan-Michael Key was quoted in The New York Times as saying of the book, "It’s great. It’s been my favorite read of the year so far." [22]
In March 2019, the film rights to The Great Eastern were acquired by the UK film company Great Point Media, and Rodman was commissioned to write the screen adaptation. [23]
Rodman is a Governor of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. [33] He founded and chairs the Writers Guild Independent Writers Caucus. [34] He has chaired FilmIndependent's Spirit Awards feature film jury [35] as well as the USC Scripter Awards. [36] He is the president of the USC chapter of the American Association of University Professors, [37] a Fellow of the Los Angeles Institute for the Humanities; [38] [39] a former trustee of the Writers Guild Foundation, [40] vice-chair of the Committee on the Professional Status of Writers; [41] and serves on several nonprofit boards, among them the Franco-American Cultural Fund, [42] and Cornell in Hollywood. [43] He is an alumnus of the Seed Fund Board of the Liberty Hill Foundation, [44] and a former editor of The Bill of Rights Journal. [45]
Rodman is also on Los Angeles committee of PEN America. [46] PEN International stands at the intersection of literature and human rights to protect free expression in the United States and worldwide. [47]
He is a member of the National Film Preservation Board, which advises Librarian of Congress on the annual selection of films to the National Film Registry. It also advises on national film preservation planning policy. [48]
Rodman is a member of The Quill and Dagger Society, founded at Cornell University in 1893.
Working with the Library Foundation of Los Angeles, [49] USC, [50] and the Writers Guild, [51] Rodman has conducted public conversations with such writers as Tom Wolfe, [52] Ricky Jay, Jeannette Seaver, Vince Gilligan, Geoff Dyer, and Lady Antonia Fraser. [53] [50]
In November 2019, he was a member of the jury [54] at the Cannes 1939 Film Festival in Orléans France. [55]
Howard Rodman also contributes to the Los Angeles Review of Books. [56] His latest articles include 'After Hours Capitalism: On Tom Lutz's "Born Slippy"' [57] a review of Tom Lutz’s "Born Slippy", [58] published by Repeater Books and 'On the 192nd Anniversary of the Birth of Jules Verne'.
Howard contributed to Black Clock literary magazine, published semi-annually by CalArts in association with its MFA Writing Program. Howard's work was published in issues 4, [59] 5, [59] 10, [59] 13, [60] 19, [61] 20, [62] 21. [61]
Howard contributed the afterword to 'No Room at the Morgue' [63] by Jean-Patrick Manchette, published in 2020 by New York Review Books. [63]
On October 31, 2013, Rodman was named a Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French Republic. [64] In January 2023 he was promoted from Chevalier to Officier.
In February 2018 he was inducted into Final Draft (software)'s Screenwriters Hall of Fame, [65] alongside Robert Towne, Steven Zaillian, Aaron Sorkin, Nancy Meyers, Paul Schrader, Lawrence Kasdan et al.
In February 2020 Rodman was presented with the USC Associates Award for Artistic Expression, "the highest honor the University bestows on its members for significant artistic impact," by USC Provost Charles Zukoski. [66]
He was married to the writer and media scholar Anne Friedberg, [67] author of The Virtual Window. [68] until her death in 2009; they have one son, Tristan Rodman. Their house, the 1957 John Lautner "Zahn Residence," has been widely published. Their work with Lautner in restoring it was chronicled in the February 2002 issue of Dwell magazine. [69]
In June 2017, he wed the artist and professor Mary Beth Heffernan.
The University of Southern California is a private research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1880 by Robert M. Widney, it is the oldest private research university in California, and has an enrollment of more than 49,000 students.
Mark Jonathan Harris is an American documentary filmmaker, writer, and educator known for his award-winning work in the documentary genre. Over the course of his career, Harris has earned three Academy Awards and numerous accolades for his contributions to filmmaking and education. He served as a Distinguished Professor and Head of Advanced Documentary Production at the USC School of Cinematic Arts, where he taught from 1983 until his retirement in 2023. Harris is also an accomplished author, having written five children's novels and a collection of short stories.
The University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts (SCA) houses eight academic divisions: Film & Television Production; Cinema & Media Studies; John C. Hench Division of Animation + Digital Arts; John Wells Division of Writing for Screen & Television; Interactive Media & Games; Media Arts + Practice; Peter Stark Producing Program and the Expanded Animation Research + Practice Program.
James Francis Ivory is an American film director, producer, and screenwriter. He was a principal in Merchant Ivory Productions along with Indian film producer Ismail Merchant and screenwriter Ruth Prawer Jhabvala. The trio is known for making film adaptations of stories by authors such as E.M. Forster and Henry James. Their body of work is celebrated for its elegance, sophistication, literary fidelity, strong performances, complex themes, and rich characters.
America Georgina Ferrera is an American actress, director and television producer. She has received numerous accolades, including a Primetime Emmy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Screen Actors Guild Award, in addition to a nomination for an Academy Award. In 2007 and 2024, Time named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world and in 2023, she was named in BBC's 100 Women list.
Brian Thomas Grazer is an American film and television producer. He founded Imagine Entertainment in 1986 with Ron Howard. The films they produced have grossed over $15 billion. Grazer was personally nominated for four Academy Awards for Splash (1984), Apollo 13 (1995), A Beautiful Mind (2001), and Frost/Nixon (2008). His films and TV series have been nominated for 47 Academy Awards and 217 Emmy Awards.
Shonda Lynn Rhimes, is an American television producer and screenwriter, and founder of the production company Shondaland. Inducted into the Television Hall of Fame and NAB Broadcasting Hall of Fame, Rhimes became known as the showrunner—creator, head writer, and executive producer—of the medical drama Grey's Anatomy (2005–present), its spin-off Private Practice (2007–2013) and the political thriller Scandal (2012–2018), becoming the first woman to create three television dramas that have achieved the 100 episode milestone.
Herman Miller was a Hollywood film writer and producer.
Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski are an American screenwriting duo, recognized for their unique approach to biopics. They introduced the term "anti-biopic" to describe their distinctive style of storytelling, which focuses on individuals who might not traditionally be considered worthy of a biographical film. Instead of highlighting conventional "great men," their work often centers on lesser-known figures within American pop culture. Their notable films in this genre include Ed Wood, The People vs. Larry Flynt, Man on the Moon, Big Eyes, Dolemite Is My Name, and the series The People v. O. J. Simpson: American Crime Story.
Chris Terrio is an American screenwriter and film director. He is best known for writing the screenplay for the 2012 film Argo, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. Terrio also won the Writers Guild Award for Best Adapted Screenplay of 2012 and was nominated for Golden Globe Award for Best Screenplay, a BAFTA, and the 2013 Los Angeles Film Critics Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for this work.
Jack Epps Jr. is an American screenwriter, author, and educator, known chiefly for such popular 1980s films as Top Gun, Legal Eagles, and The Secret of My Success, which he wrote with longtime partner Jim Cash. Epps Jr. graduated from the College of Arts and Letters at Michigan State University, and he has since gone on to teach at the University of Southern California.
Tom Lutz is an American writer, literary critic and the founder of the Los Angeles Review of Books.
Theodore Braun is an American filmmaker best known for his feature documentaries Darfur Now (2007), Betting on Zero (2017), and ¡Viva Maestro! (2022). He works in non-fiction across documentary and scripted forms with a focus on global conflict. He has won the International Documentary Association's Emerging Filmmaker Award, an NAACP Image Award for Best Feature Documentary and been nominated twice for the WGA Award for Best Feature Documentary Screenplay.
Tom Sito is an American animator, animation historian and teacher. He is currently a professor at USC's School of Cinematic Arts in the Animation Division. In 1998, Sito was included by Animation Magazine in their list of the One Hundred Most Important People in Animation.
The Producers Guild of America Award for Best Theatrical Motion Picture, also known as the Darryl F. Zanuck Award for Outstanding Producer of Theatrical Motion Pictures, is one of the annual awards given by the Producers Guild of America from 1989.
Toni Ann Johnson is an American screenwriter, playwright, and novelist.
Dara Resnik is an American screenwriter, producer, and award-winning director involved in the writing and producing of television series I Love Dick, Marvel's Daredevil, and Shooter. She is the co-creator and showrunner of Apple TV+’s Home Before Dark.
River Gallo is a Salvadoran-American filmmaker, actor, model, and intersex rights activist. They wrote, directed, and acted in the 2019 short film Ponyboi, which was the first film to feature an openly intersex actor playing an intersex person. Gallo adapted the screenplay for Ponyboi into a feature-length film by the same name, which premiered at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival. Gallo also played the lead role in the 2024 adaptation.
The Great Eastern by Howard A. Rodman is an anticolonial adventure novel, set in the 1850s-1870s in New York, London, India, Paris and the North Atlantic. Pitted against each other are two great 19th-century fictional anti-heroes, Jules Verne's Captain Nemo and Herman Melville's Captain Ahab. One lives beneath the waves and hates everything upon them. The other lives upon the waves and hates everything beneath. Caught in between is Isambard Kingdom Brunel, the preeminent civil engineer of Victorian England, kidnapped and pressed into service to build Nemo his submarine, and join him in his battle against the modern world. Melville House Publishing published it on June 4, 2019.
Sevak "Sev" Ohanian is an American film producer and screenwriter. He is best known as the co-writer and producer of the films Searching and Run, as well as executive producer on the film Judas and the Black Messiah. He is also one of the founders of Proximity Media.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link){{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link){{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)