Paul Attanasio | |
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 Attanasio in 2015 | |
| Born | November 14, 1959 The Bronx, New York, U.S. |
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| Known for | Disclosure |
Paul Albert Attanasio (born November 14, 1959) is an American screenwriter and film and television producer. He has twice been nominated for the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay, for Quiz Show (1994) and Donnie Brasco (1997).
Paul Attanasio was born in The Bronx, New York City, the son of Connie, a real estate broker, and Joseph Attanasio, a commercial consultant. [1] He is the great-grandson of immigrants from Positano on Italy's Amalfi coast. [2] He grew up in the Pelham Bay section of the Bronx, and later in Tenafly, New Jersey, where he attended public high school. [3] He is a 1981 graduate of Harvard College, where he lived in Currier House, and earned his Juris Doctor degree at Harvard Law School in 1984. [3]
Attanasio was a film critic for The Washington Post from 1984 to 1987. [4] He started writing for television with the CBS sitcom Doctor Doctor and the NBC crime drama Homicide: Life on the Street , for which he holds a 'Created by' credit. [5]
In 1995 he won a BAFTA Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for his work on Quiz Show . [6] He later wrote the screenplays for the thriller Disclosure , [4] the gangster thriller Donnie Brasco , the science fiction thriller Sphere , and the political thrillers The Sum of All Fears and The Good German . While he was making films, he started Heel & Toe Films, with a first-look production pact at Paramount Pictures on July 17, 1998. [7]
In 2000, he returned to television as an executive producer of and writer for the medical drama Gideon's Crossing, as well as the pilot for R.U.S.H. On September 10, 2001, the Heel & Toe Films production company had signed a deal with Studios USA. [8] In 2004, Attanasio, alongside his then-wife and business partner Katie Jacobs and David Shore, pitched what would become House , of which he was credited as an executive producer. He also created Tommy and co-created Bull, which premiered in 2020 and 2016, respectively.
In 2017, it was confirmed that he would be writing and executive producing a new Amazon Video series titled Tong Wars. [9]
Formerly married to his business partner Katie Jacobs, he is now married to Amanda Benefiel, an artist. With Katie Jacobs, he shares three children, Annabelle, John, and Grace. Attanasio is the brother of Mark Attanasio, a Los Angeles investment manager who is the principal owner of the Milwaukee Brewers. [10]
In 2013 John, then aged 16, was filmed driving a Chevrolet Camaro his father bought for him as a birthday gift. John is seen shouting homophobic slurs at another driver in the video, and claiming his own vehicle is "a million dollar car" - in reality it was worth under $60,000. [11] [12]
Attanasio was featured in The Dialogue interview series. In an interview with producer Mike DeLuca, he describes how he went from lambasting movies as a "snotty" Washington Post film critic to developing rewarding creative partnerships with Oscar-winning directors Robert Redford, Barry Levinson, and Steven Soderbergh.
Quiz Show is a 1994 American historical mystery-drama film directed and produced by Robert Redford. Dramatizing the Twenty-One quiz show scandals of the 1950s, the screenplay by Paul Attanasio adapts the memoirs of Richard N. Goodwin, a U.S. Congressional lawyer who investigated the accusations of game-fixing by show producers. The film chronicles the rise and fall of popular contestant Charles Van Doren after the fixed loss of Herb Stempel and Goodwin's subsequent probe.
Brian Thomas Helgeland is an American screenwriter, film producer, and director. He is most known for writing the screenplays for the films L.A. Confidential and Mystic River. He also wrote and directed the films 42, a biopic of Jackie Robinson, and Legend, about the rise and fall of the infamous London gangsters the Kray twins. His work on L.A. Confidential earned him the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay.
Dominick Napolitano, also known as Sonny Black, was an American Mafia caporegime in the Bonanno crime family. He is known for unwittingly allowing FBI agent Joseph D. Pistone to become an associate in his crew and nearly getting him made.
Michael Cormac Newell is an English film and television director and producer. He won the BAFTA for Best Direction for Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994), which also won the BAFTA Award for Best Film, and directed the films Donnie Brasco (1997) and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005).
Pelham Bay is a middle class residential neighborhood in the borough of the Bronx, in New York City. It is named for Pelham Bay Park, New York City's largest park, which lies on the neighborhood's northeastern border; and for Pelham Bay, a body of water in that park. The neighborhood is bounded roughly by Pelham Parkway on the north, the New England Thruway (I-95) on the east, the Bruckner Expressway (I-95) on the south, and the Hutchinson River Parkway on the west.
The Taking of Pelham One Two Three is a 1974 American crime drama film directed by Joseph Sargent, produced by Gabriel Katzka and Edgar J. Scherick, and starring Walter Matthau, Robert Shaw, Martin Balsam, and Héctor Elizondo. Peter Stone adapted the screenplay from the 1973 novel of the same name written by Morton Freedgood under the pen name John Godey.
Mark L. Attanasio is an American businessman from the Bronx who is the principal owner of the Milwaukee Brewers of Major League Baseball (MLB). He is worth an estimated $700 million.
Jane Loretta Anne Goldman is a British screenwriter and producer. She is mostly known for collaborating with director Matthew Vaughn on the screenplays of Kingsman: The Secret Service (2014) and its sequel Kingsman: The Golden Circle (2017), as well as X-Men: First Class (2011), Kick-Ass (2010) and Stardust (2007). Goldman also worked on the story of X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014), the sequel to First Class, again in partnership with Vaughn. Both met high critical praise for their work.
Joseph Dominick Pistone is an American former FBI agent who worked undercover as Donnie Brasco between September 1976 and July 1981, as part of an infiltration primarily into the Bonanno crime family, and to a lesser extent the Colombo crime family, two of the Five Families of the Mafia in New York City. Pistone was an FBI agent for 17 years, from 1969 until he resigned in 1986. The evidence collected by Pistone led to over 200 indictments and over 100 convictions of Mafia members, and some responsible for his infiltration were also killed by other mobsters.
Benjamin "Lefty" Ruggiero was an American mobster in the Bonanno crime family. He is well known for his friendship and mentorship of FBI undercover agent Joseph D. Pistone, who Ruggiero knew as Donnie Brasco. When Pistone's operation was ended on July 26, 1981, the FBI intercepted and arrested Ruggiero on August 29, 1981. In November 1982, Ruggiero was sentenced to 15 years in prison for racketeering conspiracy; he was released in April 1993 before his death from cancer.
Donnie Brasco is a 1997 American crime drama film directed by Mike Newell, and starring Al Pacino and Johnny Depp. Michael Madsen, Bruno Kirby, James Russo, and Anne Heche appeared in supporting roles. The film, written by Paul Attanasio, is based on the 1988 nonfiction book Donnie Brasco: My Undercover Life in the Mafia by Joseph D. Pistone and Richard Woodley.
Disclosure is a 1994 American thriller film directed by Barry Levinson, starring Michael Douglas and Demi Moore. It is based on Michael Crichton's novel of the same name. The cast also includes Donald Sutherland, Caroline Goodall and Dennis Miller. The film is a combination thriller and slight mystery in an office setting within the computer industry in the mid-1990s. The main focus of the story, from which the film and book take their titles, is the issue of sexual harassment and its power structure. The film received mixed reviews from critics but was a box office success grossing $214 million against its $50 million budget.
The London Film Critics' Circle is the name by which the Film Section of The Critics' Circle is known internationally.
Mark Johnson is an American film and television producer. He won the Academy Award for Best Picture for producing the 1988 film Rain Man.
Katie Jacobs is an American television producer and director. Katie Jacobs runs the Heel & Toe Films production company with Paul Attanasio, which produced the Fox series House and Century City. Jacobs made her directorial debut on House, directing two episodes of the third season.
Frank Anthony Vallelonga Sr., better known by his stage name Tony Lip, was an American actor. He was best known for his portrayal of crime boss Carmine Lupertazzi in the HBO series, The Sopranos. Lip portrayed real-life Bonanno crime family mobster Philip Giaccone in Donnie Brasco, and real-life Lucchese crime family mobster Francesco Manzo in Goodfellas. It was at the Copacabana nightclub that he first met Francis Ford Coppola and Louis DiGiaimo, leading to a small role in The Godfather, his film debut. He also co-wrote the book Shut Up and Eat! (2005).
Robert Miano is an American actor.
Everett De Roche (1946–2014) was an American-Australian screenwriter who worked extensively in the Australian film and TV industry. He was best known for his work in the thriller and horror genre, with such credits as Long Weekend, Patrick, and Roadgames.
Danny A. Abeckaser is an Israeli-born American actor, director and filmmaker.
The Triangle of Knowledge is a writing technique to create and amplify tension in a screenplay, teleplay or stage play identified by Eric R. Williams. The Triangle represents ‘three minds’ that contain knowledge within a scene: the Protagonist, the audience, and any other Character in the scene. According to Williams, tension is created or enhanced when one of the three corners of the triangle is deprived knowledge in the scene.
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