Roger Birnbaum | |
---|---|
Born | [1] Teaneck, New Jersey, U.S. | November 14, 1950
Occupation(s) | Film and television producer, film and television executive |
Spouse(s) | Pamela West (divorced) Leslie Lopez (m. 2013–2019) |
Partner | Teri Garr (1979–1983) |
Children | 1 |
Roger Birnbaum (born November 14, 1950) is an American film, television, and executive producer. [2] [3]
Birnbaum was born to a Jewish family [4] in Teaneck, New Jersey, [5] the son of Arlene (née Steinlauf) and Norman Birnbaum. [4] His father was a World War II veteran who went into the embroidery business with his father after the war, and used his profits in 1967 to build the Stonehenge, a residential building in New Jersey. [4] Birnbaum graduated from Teaneck High School in 1968 [5] and attended the University of Denver. [6]
Birnbaum started out in the music industry at Arista Records working under Clive Davis. A&M Records brought him out to Hollywood becoming its West Coast A&R executive, where he switch over to film. While working at film, he was appointed president of Fair Dinkum Productions, which was headed by Henry Winkler, who supervised Young Sherlock Holmes and The Sure Thing . [7] He worked at United Artists, Guber-Peters Co. (president in 1989) then 20th Century Fox. [8] He was president of production at 20th Century Fox by 1992. [9]
Caravan Pictures was founded by Birnbaum and Joe Roth as a production company at Disney in 1992 to fill the Disney Studios' then-yearly 50 to 60 production and distribution slots. [9] Birnbaum previously left Caravan at the prompting of then Disney studio chief Joe Roth as Disney was cutting its yearly production output and shutting down Caravan. In August 1998, Birnbaum with Gary Barber, former vice chairman and COO of Morgan Creek Productions founded Spyglass Entertainment. [10]
On December 20, 2010, after the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer had emerged from bankruptcy, Birnbaum and Barber became co-Chairs and co-CEOs of the studio. [11] [12] On October 3, 2012, Birnbaum announced his intention to exit his role as an MGM executive and return to "hands-on" producing. He will remain with the studio to produce films on "an exclusive basis". [13]
He has since founded three production companies, Pin High Productions, [8] Cave 76 Productions [14] and with Eli Roth, Arts District Entertainment. [15] By September 8, 2016, his exclusivity with MGM had ended. [8]
His first wife was Pamela West; [16] they had one daughter Claire Birnbaum Block (born 1987). [17] He married then-restaurant guest relations manager Leslie Lopez in 2013. [18] [19] Birnbaum and Lopez divorced in 2019. He was previously in a seven-year relationship with actress Teri Garr. [20]
Producer
Executive producer
Special thanks
Year | Film | Role | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
1998 | Making Sandwiches | Hollywood Type | Short film |
Year | Title | Notes |
---|---|---|
1984 | CBS Schoolbreak Special | |
1985 | Happily Ever After | TV movie |
1987 | Bay Coven | |
1997 | Angels in the Endzone | |
Flash | ||
2000 | Angels in the Infield | |
2003 | Miracles | |
Criminology 101 | TV movie | |
2004 | The Ranch | |
Weekends |
Year | Title | Notes |
---|---|---|
1983 | Ryan's Four | |
When Your Lover Leaves | TV movie | |
1985 | Scandal Sheet | |
Year | Title | Role | Notes |
---|---|---|---|
1979 | Music for UNICEF Concert | Executive in charge of production | TV special |
The Bee Gees Special |
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc., is an American media company specializing in film and television production and distribution based in Beverly Hills, California. MGM was founded on April 17, 1924 and has been owned by the Amazon MGM Studios subsidiary of Amazon since 2022.
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The Walt Disney Studios is a major division of the Disney Entertainment business segment of The Walt Disney Company best known for housing its multifaceted film studio divisions. Founded on October 16, 1923, and based mainly at the namesake studio lot in Burbank, California, it is the seventh-oldest global film studio and the fifth-oldest in the United States, a member of the Motion Picture Association (MPA) and one of the "Big Five" major film studios.
Spyglass Media Group, LLC is an independent film and television production and finance company founded by Gary Barber and Roger Birnbaum in 1998.
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DreamWorks Television was an American television distribution and production company based in Universal City, California, that was a division of DreamWorks. It folded into Amblin Television in 2013.
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Much of the producer's touch, the instinct that drives Birnbaum to financially back a script or to help nurture a pitch into a script and then into a feature, and his overall taste as a filmmaker, can be traced back to his formative years in Teaneck. He was raised there and attended Teaneck High School.
Claire Birnbaum and Eric Block ... husband and wife... Roger Birnbaum (then co-CEO of MGM) gave away his little girl...
Producer Roger Birnbaum became engaged to ... Leslie Lopez ... on Dec. 15
Leslie Lopez Birnbaum ... and Roger Birnbaum
Well, I lived with two men, one for seven years, the other for five. I was with Birnbaum (Roger Birnbaum, an independent producer) for seven. That was like a marriage.