Ken Kwapis

Last updated

Ken Kwapis
Ken Kwapis 2008.jpg
Kwapis in Los Angeles in 2008.
Born
Kenneth William Kwapis

(1957-08-17) August 17, 1957 (age 66)
Education Northwestern University, University of Southern California
Occupation(s) Film and television director, screenwriter, author
Years active1983–present
Notable work
Spouse Marisa Silver
Children2

Kenneth William Kwapis (born August 17, 1957) is an American film and television director, screenwriter, and author. He specialized in single-camera sitcoms in the 1990s and 2000s and has directed feature films such as Sesame Street Presents: Follow That Bird (1985), The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (2005), and He's Just Not That Into You (2009). [1]

Contents

Personal life

Kwapis was born in East St. Louis, Illinois, and grew up in neighboring Belleville. [2] He is the son of Marge ( née  Wells) and Bruno Walter Kwapis, who was an oral surgeon. [3] [4] [5] He is of Polish descent [6] and was raised Catholic, [7] attending the Jesuit preparatory academy at St. Louis University High School.

He earned a bachelor's degree at Northwestern University's School of Speech, after which he traveled west to enroll in the M.F.A. program at the USC School of Cinema-Television. [8]

Kwapis' twenty-four-minute thesis film, For Heaven's Sake, won the Student Academy Award in 1982. The film is a contemporary adaptation of Mozart's one-act opera Der Schauspieldirektor (The Impresario).

Family

Kwapis is married to author and film director Marisa Silver, with whom he has two sons: Henry and Oliver. [9] [10] [11]

Career

1980s

In 1983, Kwapis directed Revenge of the Nerd for CBS' Afternoon Playhouse, followed by Summer Switch for ABC's Afterschool Special. Starring Robert Klein, Summer Switch is an adaptation of the novel of the same name, the sequel to a young adult fantasy, Freaky Friday . For the Scholastic Book Company, Kwapis directed his first feature film, The Beniker Gang , starring Andrew McCarthy.

Kwapis next film was Sesame Street Presents: Follow That Bird (Warner Bros., 1985). The film was the big-screen debut of the Sesame Street ensemble (Big Bird, Oscar the Grouch, The Count, Cookie Monster, Grover, Bert and Ernie, et al.). Follow That Bird tells the story of Big Bird's quest to return to his family on Sesame Street when a social worker arranges for Big Bird to move in with a family of his own kind, the Dodo Birds, in Oceanview, Illinois. [12]

In 1987, Kwapis made his prime time television debut, directing an installment of Steven Spielberg's Amazing Stories .

Kwapis second feature Vibes (Columbia, 1988) was made under Ron Howard and Brian Grazer's fledgling Imagine banner. Written by Lowell Ganz and Babaloo Mandel, Vibes is the tale of two psychics (Jeff Goldblum and Cyndi Lauper) who are enlisted by a fortune hunter (Peter Falk) to divine the whereabouts of a treasure hidden in the Andes. The film was shot on location in Ecuador, and features a pan pipe-flavored score by James Horner.

1990s

Kwapis began the 1990s with a feature-film project, He Said, She Said (Paramount, 1991)—co-directed by his now-wife Marisa Silver. The film, written by Brian Hohlfeld, is a romantic comedy in which the same events are recounted twice—once from each partner's point of view. The woman's (Elizabeth Perkins) portion of the film was directed by Silver and the man's (Kevin Bacon) by Kwapis. The film also features Sharon Stone and Nathan Lane. Silver gave the film its title, based on a phrase that has been used to mean either "cross-gender discourse" or "testimony in direct conflict." [13]

Kwapis then moved into series television, directing the pilot of HBO's comedy The Larry Sanders Show , which influenced many subsequent shows. [14] He directed twelve episodes of the series.

Kwapis also contributed two episodes to the sci-fi series Eerie, Indiana .

Kwapis fourth feature, Dunston Checks In (Twentieth Century Fox, 1996), stars Jason Alexander as the manager of a grand hotel in New York City, which is owned and operated by a tyrant in the Leona Helmsley mold (Faye Dunaway). An aristocrat of dubious origin (Rupert Everett) checks into the hotel with an orangutan jewel thief.

Kwapis next film, The Beautician and the Beast (Paramount, 1997), evokes the Ruritanian comedies of Ernst Lubitsch. Fran Drescher plays a New York cosmetologist who is mistakenly hired to tutor the children of the despotic president of Slovetzia (Timothy Dalton).

In the late 1990s, Kwapis directed two episodes of NBC's short-lived cult following show Freaks and Geeks .

2000s

In the first decade of the 2000s, Kwapis directed nineteen episodes of Fox's Malcolm in the Middle , earning a Primetime Emmy Award nomination for his work as a producer-director.

In 2001, Kwapis helped develop The Bernie Mac Show for Fox, directing the pilot and ten additional episodes, including the series finale, "Bernie's Angels". Also for Fox, Kwapis was one of the main creative forces behind Grounded for Life , a hybrid comedy combining single- and multi-camera techniques. Kwapis experimented with the form even further in the pilot of Watching Ellie , Julia Louis-Dreyfus' follow-up to Seinfeld . The distinctive pilot has a story that unfolds in real time, with an on-screen clock. Playing the role of Ellie's ex-boyfriend is Steve Carell, with whom Kwapis would shortly collaborate on his next major project.

In 2005, Kwapis was instrumental in adapting the BBC mockumentary, The Office , for American television under the same title, for NBC. He directed the pilot and had a significant impact on the look of the entire program—including the iconic set design. [15] Showrunner Greg Daniels, production designer Donald Lee Harris, and he developed an open floor plan that allowed camera operators to catch characters "unaware". And they purposely created an office layout with immovable walls to emphasize its airless, claustrophobic atmosphere. [15] Kwapis went on to direct 13 additional episodes, including the 100th episode of the series, "Company Picnic", and the series finale. His work on the third-season premiere, "Gay Witch Hunt", earned him a second Primetime Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Directing for a Comedy Series.

For Showtime Independent Pictures, Kwapis wrote and directed Sexual Life (2005), loosely based on Arthur Schnitzler's satiric story taking place in fin-de-siècle Vienna, La Ronde .

Kwapis next feature was another adaptation, Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (Warner Bros., 2006), based on the bestselling young adult novel by Ann Brashares. Sisterhood, a coming-of-age story about four sixteen-year-old friends, stars Amber Tamblyn, Alexis Bledel, America Ferrera, and Blake Lively (her screen debut).

His next feature, License to Wed (Warner Bros., 2007), follows a young couple (Mandy Moore and John Krasinski), as they embark upon an unorthodox pre-marital course, devised by a highly mischievous and somewhat perverse minister (Robin Williams). Designed to determine their compatibility, the course compresses the first ten years of marriage into one week.

Kwapis follow-up was another look at romantic entanglements, He's Just Not That Into You (New Line Cinema, 2009). The film is adapted from the bestselling advice book by Greg Behrendt and Liz Tuccillo, which encouraged people to learn to read romantic signals correctly. The film stars Ben Affleck, Jennifer Aniston, Drew Barrymore, Jennifer Connelly, Kevin Connolly, Bradley Cooper, Ginnifer Goodwin, Scarlett Johansson, and Justin Long.

2010s

Kwapis launched his seventh series and directed his tenth feature film in 2010. He was the executive producer and director of the pilot of Outsourced , a half-hour comedy for NBC. Adapted from the 2006 feature film of the same name, Outsourced tells the story of a Kansas City-based novelties company that ships all of its customer service jobs to India. The one American employee not to be fired, Todd Dempsey (Ben Rappaport), goes to Mumbai to oversee the call center.

For Working Title Films, and Universal Pictures, Kwapis directed the rescue adventure Big Miracle , starring Drew Barrymore and John Krasinski. [16] Based on a real event that took place in 1988, the film tells the tale of a small town newsman (Krasinski) and a Greenpeace volunteer (Barrymore) who are joined by rival world superpowers to save a family of gray whales trapped in the ice of the Arctic Ocean. The film was shot during fall 2010 in Alaska and released in 2012.

In 2013, nine years after bringing the pilot to U.S. television, Kwapis directed the series finale of The Office . He also produced the half-hour Showtime pilot Happyish , written by Shalom Auslander and starring Philip Seymour Hoffman. The project stalled after Hoffman's death, but was eventually recast with Steve Coogan. It made its debut on Showtime in April 2015 and, in addition to producing, Kwapis directed four of its episodes. [17]

In 2014, Kwapis directed the feature film A Walk in the Woods , based on the bestselling travel memoir by Bill Bryson. The film stars Robert Redford and Nick Nolte as two old friends who decide to walk the 2,100-mile Appalachian Trail. The film, which was co-produced by Redford, also stars Emma Thompson and Mary Steenburgen, and premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2015. A Walk in the Woods was released by Broad Green on September 2, 2015.

Kwapis returned to single-camera half-hour comedy in 2016 and directed four episodes of Tig Notaro's semi-autobiographical Internet television series, One Mississippi —two per season in 2016 and 2017. [18] The show was produced by Amazon Studios. [19] For Netflix, he has directed episodes of Santa Clarita Diet , a comedy starring and produced by Drew Barrymore and first released February 3, 2017. [20]

2020s

Book by Kwapis, released in 2020 ButWhatIReallyWanttoDoIsDirect Cover.jpg
Book by Kwapis, released in 2020

In April 2020, Netflix released the first season of the show #BlackAF , created by and starring Kenya Barris, three episodes of which were directed by Kwapis. [21]

Kwapis was a guest on the July 15, 2020 episode of the podcast Office Ladies, hosted by The Office stars Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey, to discuss his work on The Office and, specifically, the season two finale, Casino Night, which he directed. [22]

An autobiographical memoir of Kwapis' career in film and televisionBut What I Really Want to do is Directwas released October 6, 2020 by St. Martin's Griffin. [23] [24] An excerpt was published in The Los Angeles Review of Books [25] and Entertainment Weekly and the Saint Louis Post-Dispatch featured interviews with Kwapis about it. [26] [11] Film academic David Bordwell favorably reviewed it, saying, the book "...ranks with Sidney Lumet's Making Movies and Alexander Mackendrick's On Film-Making, the most acute personal reflections on Hollywood directing." [27] Kwapis has used his book as the premise for master classes at the Sundance Institute and the St. Louis International Film Festival. [28] [29]

Producer Greg Daniels and actor/producer Steve Carell, both of whom worked with Kwapis on The Office , hired him to direct all seven episodes of season two of Space Force , which was released by Netflix on February 18, 2022. Producer Daniels explained that they refocused the tone and emphases of the show for the second season and that they had brought Kwapis in to help achieve that goal. [30] [31] [32]

Filmography

Film

Television

YearTitleDirectorProducerNotes
1983 CBS Afternoon Playhouse YesNoEpisode "Revenge of the Nerds"
1984 ABC Afterschool Special YesNoEpisode "Summer Switch"
1987 Amazing Stories YesNoEpisode "Lane Change"
1992 Eerie, Indiana YesNo2 episodes
1992–1993 The Larry Sanders Show YesNo12 episodes
1993 Route 66 YesNoEpisode "The Stolen Bride"
Bakersfield P.D. YesNo3 episodes
1998 The Wonderful World of Disney YesNoEpisode "Noah"
1999–2000 Freaks and Geeks YesNo2 episodes
ER YesNo2 episodes
2000–2004 Malcolm in the Middle YesYes19 episodes
2001 Grounded for Life YesNo4 episodes
2001–2006 The Bernie Mac Show YesYes11 episodes
2002 Watching Ellie YesYes3 episodes
2003About a BoyYesNoUnsold pilot
2005–2013 The Office YesExecutive13 episodes
2010 Parks and Recreation YesNoEpisode "Galentine's Day"
2010–2011 Outsourced YesExecutive2 episodes
2015 Happyish YesExecutive4 episodes
2016–2017 One Mississippi YesNo4 episodes
2017–2019 Santa Clarita Diet YesNo5 episodes
2018 The Dangerous Book for Boys YesNoEpisode "How to Build a Treehouse"
2020 #BlackAF YesNo3 episodes
2022 Space Force YesNo7 episodes

Related Research Articles

<i>The Larry Sanders Show</i> American television sitcom (1992–1998)

The Larry Sanders Show is an American television sitcom set in the office and studio of a fictional late-night talk show. The series was created by Garry Shandling and Dennis Klein and aired from August 15, 1992, to May 31, 1998, on the HBO cable television network.

James Edward Burrows, sometimes known as Jim "Jimmy" Burrows, is an American television director. Burrows has received numerous accolades including 11 Primetime Emmy Awards and five Directors Guild of America Awards. He was honored with the Directors Guild of America Lifetime Achievement Award in 2015 and NBC special Must See TV: An All-Star Tribute to James Burrows in 2016.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Greg Daniels</span> American writer, producer, and director (born 1963)

Gregory Martin Daniels is an American screenwriter, television producer, and director. He has worked on several television series, including writing for Saturday Night Live and The Simpsons, adapting The Office for the United States, and co-creating Parks and Recreation and King of the Hill. Daniels attended Harvard University, where he befriended and began collaborating with Conan O'Brien. His first writing credit was for Not Necessarily the News, before he was laid off because of budget cuts.

The Office is an American mockumentary sitcom television series that depicts the everyday work lives of office employees at the Scranton, Pennsylvania, branch of the fictional Dunder Mifflin Paper Company. It aired on NBC from March 24, 2005, to May 16, 2013, with a total of nine seasons consisting of 201 episodes. Based on the 2001–2003 BBC series of the same name created by Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, the show was created by Greg Daniels, a veteran writer for Saturday Night Live, King of the Hill, and The Simpsons. It was co-produced by Daniels' Deedle-Dee Productions and Reveille Productions, in association with Universal Television. The original executive producers were Daniels, Gervais, Merchant, Howard Klein and Ben Silverman, with numerous others being promoted in later seasons.

"Booze Cruise" is the eleventh episode of the second season of the American comedy television series The Office and the show's seventeenth episode overall. Written by Greg Daniels and directed by Ken Kwapis, the episode first aired in the United States on January 5, 2006 on NBC. The episode featured Rob Riggle and Amy Adams as guest stars.

"Sexual Harassment" is the second episode of the second season of the American comedy television series The Office and the show's eighth episode overall. The episode was written by B. J. Novak and directed by Ken Kwapis. The episode first aired in the United States on September 27, 2005, on NBC. "Sexual Harassment" saw the first physical appearance of recurring character Todd Packer after first being heard through a phone call in the first episode.

"The Fire" is the fourth episode of the second season of the American comedy television series The Office and the show's tenth episode overall. Written by B. J. Novak and directed by Ken Kwapis, the episode first aired in the United States on October 11, 2005, on NBC. The episode features Amy Adams as Jim's girlfriend, Katy.

"The Client" is the seventh episode of the second season of the American comedy television series The Office and the show's thirteenth episode overall. Written by Paul Lieberstein, who also acts in the show as Toby Flenderson, and directed by Greg Daniels, the episode first aired in the United States on November 8, 2005, on NBC.

"Casino Night" is the second season finale of the American comedy television series The Office and the twenty-eighth episode overall. Written by Steve Carell, who also acts in the show as Michael Scott, and directed by Ken Kwapis, the episode originally aired in the United States on May 11, 2006, on NBC. The episode guest stars Nancy Carell as Carol Stills and Melora Hardin as Jan Levinson.

"Gay Witch Hunt" is the third-season premiere of the American comedy television series The Office and the show's twenty-ninth episode overall. Written by executive producer and show runner Greg Daniels and directed by Ken Kwapis, the episode first aired in the United States on September 21, 2006, on NBC.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jan Levinson</span> Fictional character

Janet Levinson is a recurring fictional character from the US television series The Office, portrayed by Melora Hardin. She is the Vice President of Northeast Sales at the paper distribution company Dunder Mifflin, directly supervising central character and Regional Manager of Dunder Mifflin's Scranton branch, Michael Scott. Her character is notable for the dysfunctional relationship she enters with Michael following the second-season episode, "The Client", until the fourth-season episode "Dinner Party". Michael and Jan's personas contrast to much humor in the series, particularly in their professional attitudes and social interactions, although Jan's erratic and sexually-domineering state of mind leads to her firing. Her counterpart in the British version is corporate manager Jennifer Taylor-Clarke, who was played by Stirling Gallacher.

"The Job" is the third-season finale of the American version of The Office and the show's 52nd and 53rd episodes overall. In this episode, Michael prepares for his interview for the corporate job and names Dwight as his successor, whose managing methods are unpopular. Jan arrives at the office to see Michael and everyone is shocked when it appears she has undergone breast augmentation. Jim and Karen also interview for the corporate position, and Pam deals with the consequences of her earlier outburst.

<i>The Office</i> (American TV series) season 3 Season of television series

The third season of the American sitcom The Office premiered in the United States on NBC on September 21, 2006, and concluded on May 17, 2007. The season had a total of 25 half-hours of material, divided into 16 half-hour episodes, five 40-minute "super-sized" episodes, and two one-hour episodes. The Office is an American adaptation of the British TV series as a mockumentary portraying the daily lives of office employees in the Scranton, Pennsylvania branch of the fictitious Dunder Mifflin Paper Company. The season stars Steve Carell, Rainn Wilson, John Krasinski, Jenna Fischer, and B. J. Novak, with supporting performances from Melora Hardin, David Denman, Ed Helms, Leslie David Baker, Brian Baumgartner, Kate Flannery, Mindy Kaling, Angela Kinsey, Paul Lieberstein, Oscar Nunez, and Phyllis Smith.

<i>The Office</i> (American TV series) season 1 Season of television series

The first season of the American television comedy The Office premiered in the United States on NBC on March 24, 2005, concluded on April 26, 2005, and consists of six episodes. The Office is an American adaptation of the British TV series, and is presented in a mockumentary format, portraying the daily lives of office employees in the Scranton, Pennsylvania branch of the fictitious Dunder Mifflin Paper Company. The season stars Steve Carell, Rainn Wilson, John Krasinski, Jenna Fischer, and B. J. Novak.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jeffrey Blitz</span> American film director, film producer and screenwriter

Jeffrey Blitz is an American film director, screenwriter and producer best known for the documentary Spellbound (2003), The Office, the fiction film Rocket Science (2007) and Comedy Central’sReview. Blitz is a two-time Emmy Award winner, the winner of the Directing Prize at Sundance and an Academy Award nominee.

"Company Picnic" is the fifth season finale of the American comedy television series The Office and the 100th overall episode of the series. It originally aired on NBC in the United States on May 14, 2009. In the episode, Michael plans to win back his ex-girlfriend Holly at a Dunder Mifflin company picnic, while the rest of the Scranton office get involved in a competitive company volleyball tournament.

<i>Friday Night Dinner</i> British television sitcom

Friday Night Dinner is a British sitcom created by Robert Popper that aired on Channel 4 from 25 February 2011 to 1 May 2020. Starring Tamsin Greig, Paul Ritter, Simon Bird, Tom Rosenthal, and Mark Heap, it follows the regular Friday night dinner experience of the Jewish middle-class Goodman family in North London. Following the conclusion of the sixth series and Ritter's death in 2021, it was announced that the show would not return. The show is filmed using a single-camera setup.

"Finale" is the series finale of the American comedy television series The Office. It serves as the 24th and 25th episodes of the ninth season, and the 200th and 201st episodes of the series overall. The episode was written by series developer and executive producer Greg Daniels and directed by Ken Kwapis, who directed the series' pilot episode. It originally aired on NBC on May 16, 2013, preceded by an hour-long series retrospective.

Michael Begler is an American television writer, producer and screenwriter. He is best known for co-creating Cinemax's period medical drama The Knick, and for writing the films Raising Helen (2004), The Shaggy Dog (2006) and Big Miracle (2012), all with writing partner Jack Amiel.

<i>Space Force</i> (TV series) American television series

Space Force is an American workplace comedy television series created by Greg Daniels and Steve Carell for Netflix. It centers on a group of people tasked with establishing the sixth branch of the United States Armed Forces, the United States Space Force. It stars Steve Carell, John Malkovich, Ben Schwartz, Diana Silvers, Lisa Kudrow, Tawny Newsome and Jimmy O. Yang. It premiered on Netflix on May 29, 2020, to mixed reviews. In November 2020, it was renewed for a second season which premiered on February 18, 2022, to generally favourable reviews. In April 2022, the series was cancelled after two seasons.

References

  1. Longwell, Todd (February 2, 2006). "Big 'Mac'". Hollywood Reporter. Archived from the original on May 13, 2006. Retrieved March 15, 2006.
  2. Anderson, Carla Keller (April 29, 2005). "Before they were stars..." Belleville News-Democrat. Archived from the original on October 28, 2005. Retrieved March 15, 2006.
  3. "ABOUT KEN KWAPIS". Belleville News-Democrat. February 8, 2009.
  4. "Our War: Korea ... Belleville surgeon Dr. Bruno Kwapis rebuilt faces of war | Belleville News-Democrat". Bnd.com. September 19, 2010. Retrieved April 4, 2017.
  5. "Bruno W. Kwapis Obituary: View Bruno Kwapis's Obituary by Belleville News-Democrat". Legacy.com. Retrieved April 4, 2017.
  6. Kasindorf, Martin (February 17, 1991). "What They're Saying He Said, She Said' chronicles the war of the sexes from both sides. Guess What: The viewpoints differ". Newsday.
  7. Grove, Martin A. (June 20, 2007). "Sick of fantasies? 'Wed' offers return to reality". The Hollywood Reporter. Archived from the original on September 15, 2007.
  8. "Notable Alumni". USC School of Cinema-Television. Archived from the original on February 16, 2006. Retrieved March 15, 2006.
  9. Rochlin, Margy (January 30, 2009). "Keeping Things Human Size, Despite the Stars". The New York Times . Retrieved November 18, 2011.
  10. Alger, Derek (July 1, 2010). "Marisa Silver". Pif Magazine.
  11. 1 2 Pennington, Gail (October 2, 2020). "Ken Kwapis, who got 'The Office' off the ground, has advice for aspiring directors". Post-Dispatch. Retrieved October 7, 2020.
  12. Follow That Bird (1985) - Plot - IMDb , retrieved August 13, 2023
  13. For the etymology of the phrase "he said, she said," see William Safire, "On Language; He-Said, She-Said," https://www.nytimes.com/1998/04/12/magazine/on-language-he-said-she-said.html .
  14. Cheadle, Harry (March 1, 2011). "Your Favorite Comedy Exists Because of 'The Larry Sanders Show'". Vulture. Retrieved March 5, 2022.
  15. 1 2 Glassman, Thea (March 19, 2020). "How the Remarkably Unremarkable World of Dunder Mifflin Was Built". Architectural Digest. Retrieved March 8, 2022.
  16. "Director Ken Kwapis hunts 'Whales'". Archived from the original on June 9, 2009.
  17. Friedlander, Whitney (July 24, 2015). "Showtime Cancels 'Happyish' After One Season". Variety. Retrieved November 2, 2016.
  18. "Ken Kwapis - IMDb". imdb.com. August 17, 1957. Retrieved September 21, 2017.
  19. Andreeva, Dominic Patten, Nellie (January 18, 2018). "'One Mississippi', 'I Love Dick' & 'Jean-Claude Van Johnson' Canceled By Amazon". Deadline. Retrieved January 18, 2018.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  20. "Ken Kwapis". TV Guide. Retrieved May 17, 2017.
  21. "#BlackAF Full Cast and Crew". IMDB. Retrieved July 30, 2020.
  22. "Episode 36: Casino Night Revisited with Ken Kwapis". Office Ladies. July 15, 2020. Retrieved July 30, 2020.
  23. Kwapis, Ken (2020). But What I Really Want to do is Direct: Lessons from a Life Behind the Camera (First ed.). New York, NY: St. Martin's Griffin. ISBN   978-1-250-26012-3. OCLC   1130362898.
  24. "But What I Really Want To Do Is Direct - Official Website". But What I Really Want To Do Is Direct. Retrieved September 1, 2020.
  25. Kwapis, Ken (October 5, 2020). "Hal's Ready for His Close-up: An Excerpt from But What I Really Want to Do Is Direct".{{cite magazine}}: Cite magazine requires |magazine= (help)
  26. Sanchez, Omar (October 6, 2020). "'The Office' director Ken Kwapis on creating a non-toxic set: 'It's honestly not that hard'". Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved October 6, 2020.
  27. Bordwell, David (May 30, 2021). "Five Critics, One of Them a Killer". Observations on Film Art. Retrieved June 2, 2021.
  28. "Master Class Archive: Lessons from a Life Behind the Camera with Ken Kwapis". Sundance Institute. Retrieved June 27, 2022.
  29. Gabe, Sheets (November 13, 2020). "SLIFF Interview: Director Ken Kwapis - Master Class Class Subject November 14th". We Are Movie Geeks. Retrieved June 27, 2022.
  30. Weintraub, Steve (January 27, 2022). "Exclusive: 'Space Force' Creator Greg Daniels on How They Refocused the Show in Season 2 and Why They Brought in Director Ken Kwapis". Collider. Retrieved March 2, 2022.
  31. Miller, Liz Shannon (February 26, 2022). "'Space Force' Director Ken Kwapis on Making Changes For Season 2". Consequence. Retrieved March 2, 2022.
  32. Darwish, Meaghan (February 17, 2022). "'Space Force' Season 2 Director Ken Kwapis on Reuniting With 'The Office' Team". TV Insider. Retrieved March 2, 2022.