The USC School of Cinematic Arts, until 2006 named the School of Cinema-Television (CNTV), is a film school

Film school

The term film school is used to describe any educational institution dedicated to teaching aspects of filmmaking, including such subjects as film production, film theory, digital media production, and screenwriting. Film history courses and hands-on technical training are usually incorporated into...

 within the University of Southern California

University of Southern California

The University of Southern California is a private, not-for-profit, nonsectarian, research university located in Los Angeles, California, United States. USC was founded in 1880, making it California's oldest private research university...

 in Los Angeles, California

Los Angeles, California

Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...

. It is the oldest and largest such school in the United States, established in 1929 as a joint venture with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is a professional honorary organization dedicated to the advancement of the arts and sciences of motion pictures...

. The school offers multiple undergraduate and graduate

Graduate school

A graduate school is a school that awards advanced academic degrees with the general requirement that students must have earned a previous undergraduate degree...

 programs. For 2006-2007, the school had 865 undergraduates and 653 graduate students. It is widely recognized as one of the most prestigious film programs in the world.

The School’s founding faculty include Douglas Fairbanks

Douglas Fairbanks

Douglas Fairbanks, Sr. was an American actor, screenwriter, director and producer. He was best known for his swashbuckling roles in silent films such as The Thief of Bagdad, Robin Hood, and The Mark of Zorro....

, D. W. Griffith

D. W. Griffith

David Llewelyn Wark Griffith was a premier pioneering American film director. He is best known as the director of the controversial and groundbreaking 1915 film The Birth of a Nation and the subsequent film Intolerance .Griffith's film The Birth of a Nation made pioneering use of advanced camera...

, William C. DeMille

William C. DeMille

Willam C. deMille was an American screenwriter and film director from the silent movie era through the early 1930s. He was also a noted playwright prior to moving into film. Once he was established in film he specialized in adapting Broadway plays into silent films...

, Ernst Lubitsch

Ernst Lubitsch

Ernst Lubitsch was a German-born film director. His urbane comedies of manners gave him the reputation of being Hollywood's most elegant and sophisticated director; as his prestige grew, his films were promoted as having "the Lubitsch touch."In 1947 he received an Honorary Academy Award for his...

, Irving Thalberg

Irving Thalberg

Irving Grant Thalberg was an American film producer during the early years of motion pictures. He was called "The Boy Wonder" for his youth and his extraordinary ability to select the right scripts, choose the right actors, gather the best production staff and make very profitable films.-Life and...

, and Darryl Zanuck. Notable professors include Drew Casper

Drew Casper

Joseph Andrew "Drew" Casper is a Professor of Critical Studies in the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California and considered to be an authority on American film from World War II to the present. While a Ph.D. student at USC, Dr. Casper's mentor, Irwin Blacker, died...

, the Alma and Alfred Hitchcock

Alfred Hitchcock

Sir Alfred Joseph Hitchcock, KBE was a British film director and producer. He pioneered many techniques in the suspense and psychological thriller genres. After a successful career in British cinema in both silent films and early talkies, Hitchcock moved to Hollywood...

 Professor of American Film; Tomlinson Holman

Tomlinson Holman

Tomlinson M. Holman is an American film theorist, audio engineer, and inventor of film technologies, notably the Lucasfilm THX sound system. He developed the world's first 10.2 sound system. Earlier, Holman developed what was known as the Holman Preamplifier, for the Apt Corporation. He holds a...

, inventor of THX

THX

THX is a trade name of a high-fidelity audio/visual reproduction standard for movie theaters, screening rooms, home theaters, computer speakers, gaming consoles, and car audio systems. The current THX was created in 2001 when it spun off from Lucasfilm Ltd...

; David Bondelevitch, President of the Motion Picture Sound Editors; and Mark Jonathan Harris

Mark Jonathan Harris

Mark Jonathan Harris is an American documentary filmmaker probably best known for his films Into the Arms of Strangers: Stories of the Kindertransport and The Long Way Home...

, documentary filmmaker.

In April 2006, the USC Board of Trustees voted to change the school's name to the USC School of Cinematic Arts.

On September 19, 2006, USC announced that alumnus George Lucas

George Lucas

George Walton Lucas, Jr. is an American film producer, screenwriter, and director, and entrepreneur. He is the founder, chairman and chief executive of Lucasfilm. He is best known as the creator of the space opera franchise Star Wars and the archaeologist-adventurer character Indiana Jones...

 had donated US$175 million to expand the film school with a new 137000 square feet (12,727.7 m²) facility. This represented the largest single donation to USC and the largest to any film school in the world. His previous donations resulted in the naming of two existing buildings after him and his then-wife

Marcia Lucas

Marcia Lucas is an American film editor.In 1974, Lucas and Verna Fields were nominated for the Academy Award for Film Editing for their work on American Graffiti...

, though Lucas was not fond of the architecture used in those buildings. An architectural hobbyist, Lucas laid out the original designs for the project, inspired by the Mediterranean Revival Style

Mediterranean Revival Style architecture

The Mediterranean Revival was an eclectic design style that was first introduced in the United States about the end of the nineteenth century, and became popular during the 1920s and 1930s...

 that was used in older campus buildings as well as the Los Angeles area. The project also received another $50 million in contributions from Warner Bros.

Warner Bros.

Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc., also known as Warner Bros. Pictures or simply Warner Bros. , is an American producer of film and television entertainment.One of the major film studios, it is a subsidiary of Time Warner, with its headquarters in Burbank,...

, 20th Century Fox

20th Century Fox

Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation — also known as 20th Century Fox, or simply 20th or Fox — is one of the six major American film studios...

 and The Walt Disney Company

The Walt Disney Company

The Walt Disney Company is the largest media conglomerate in the world in terms of revenue. Founded on October 16, 1923, by Walt and Roy Disney as the Disney Brothers Cartoon Studio, Walt Disney Productions established itself as a leader in the American animation industry before diversifying into...

.

The USC School of Cinematic Arts joined forces with the Royal Film Commission of Jordan to create the Red Sea Institute of Cinematic Arts

Red Sea Institute of Cinematic Arts

The Red Sea Institute of Cinematic Arts is the first and only MFA program in Cinematic Arts for the Middle East and North Africa. It is based in Aqaba, Jordan. RSICA is a joint effort of Royal Film Commission of Jordan and the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts...

 (RSICA) in Aqaba

Aqaba

Aqaba is a coastal city in the far south of Jordan, the capital of Aqaba Governorate at the head of the Gulf of Aqaba. Aqaba is strategically important to Jordan as it is the country's only seaport. Aqaba is best known today as a diving and beach resort, but industrial activity remains important...

, Jordan

Jordan

Jordan , officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan , Al-Mamlaka al-Urduniyya al-Hashemiyya) is a kingdom on the East Bank of the River Jordan. The country borders Saudi Arabia to the east and south-east, Iraq to the north-east, Syria to the north and the West Bank and Israel to the west, sharing...

.

Distinctions

• Since 1973, at least one alumnus of SCA has been nominated for an Academy Award
  Academy Awards
  An Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...
  
   annually, totaling 256 nominations and 78 wins.
• Since 1973, at least one SCA alumnus or alumna has been nominated for the Emmy Award
  Emmy Award
  An Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
  
   annually, totalling 473 nominations and 119 wins.
• The top 17 grossing films of all time have had an SCA graduate in a key creative position.

Awards for USC Cinema short films

• In 1955, producer Wilber T. Blume, a USC Cinema instructor at the time, received an Academy Award for best live action short film for a film he created entitled The Face of Lincoln
  The Face of Lincoln
  The Face of Lincoln is a 1955 short documentary film in which sculptor Robert Merrell Gage models the features of Abraham Lincoln while narrating the story of Lincoln's life. It won an Academy Award in 1956 for Best Short Subject and was also nominated for Academy Award for Documentary Short Subject...
  
  . Blume also received an Academy Award nomination that year for documentary short.
• In 1967, George Lucas
  George Lucas
  George Walton Lucas, Jr. is an American film producer, screenwriter, and director, and entrepreneur. He is the founder, chairman and chief executive of Lucasfilm. He is best known as the creator of the space opera franchise Star Wars and the archaeologist-adventurer character Indiana Jones...
  
   won the National Student Film Festival (NSFF) award for his futuristic Electronic Labyrinth: THX 1138 4EB.
• In 1970, producer John Longenecker
  John Longenecker
  John Longenecker is an American film producer, Directors Guild of America member, screenwriter and cinematographer who produced the Academy Award winning live action short film, The Resurrection of Broncho Billy .-Biography:...
  
   received an Academy Award for best live action short film for a film he produced while attending USC Cinema 480 classes as an undergraduate—The Resurrection of Broncho Billy
  The Resurrection of Broncho Billy
  The Resurrection of Broncho Billy is a 1970 live action short Western film, starring Johnny Crawford. It won an Academy Award for Best Short Subject.-Plot:...
  
  . The film's crew and cast included Nick Castle
  Nick Castle
  Nick Castle is an American actor, screenwriter and film director, best known for his role as Michael Myers in Halloween. He also co-wrote Escape from New York with his friend, John Carpenter.-Early life:...
  
  , cinematographer; John Carpenter
  John Carpenter
  John Howard Carpenter is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, editor, composer, and occasional actor. Although Carpenter has worked in numerous film genres in his four-decade career, his name is most commonly associated with horror and science fiction.- Early life :Carpenter was born...
  
  , film editor and original music; James Rokos, director; Johnny Crawford
  Johnny Crawford
  John Ernest "Johnny" Crawford is a prolific American character actor, singer and musician. At 12, Crawford rose to fame for playing Mark McCain, the son of the Lucas McCain character , in the popular 1960s ABC western series, The Rifleman, which aired from 1958 to 1963...
  
  , lead actor; and Kristin Nelson
  Kristin Nelson
  Kristin Nelson, also Kristin Nelson Tinker, is an American primitive painter, actor, and author. She was married to Rick Nelson.-Early life:...
  
  , lead actress.
• In 1973, Robert Zemeckis
  Robert Zemeckis
  Robert Lee Zemeckis is an American film director, producer and screenwriter. Zemeckis first came to public attention in the 1980s as the director of the comedic time-travel Back to the Future film series, as well as the Academy Award-winning live-action/animation epic Who Framed Roger Rabbit ,...
  
   won a Special Jury Award at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences' second annual Student Film Awards presentation for A Field of Honor.
• In 2001, MFA
  Master of Arts (postgraduate)
  A Master of Arts from the Latin Magister Artium, is a type of Master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The M.A. is usually contrasted with the M.S. or M.Sc. degrees...
  
   student David Greenspan won the Palme d’Or for short film at the Cannes Film Festival
  Cannes Film Festival
  The Cannes International Film Festival , is an annual film festival held in Cannes, France, which previews new films of all genres including documentaries from around the world. Founded in 1946, it is among the world's most prestigious and publicized film festivals...
  
   for his student film Bean Cake.
• In 2006, director, co-writer, and producer Ari Sandel
  Ari Sandel
  Ari Sandel is the director of the short film, West Bank Story, which won the 2006 Academy Award in the category Best Short Film ....
  
   received an Academy Award for best live action short film ("West Bank Story
  West Bank Story
  West Bank Story is a comedy/musical short film, directed by Ari Sandel, co-written by Sandel and Kim Ray, produced by Pascal Vaguelsy, Amy Kim, Ashley Jordan, Ravi Malhotra, Bill Boland and featuring choreography by Ramon Del Barrio. The film is a parody of the classic musical film West Side Story,...
  
  ") made as a USC Cinema graduate school project.
• In 2009, MFA student Gregg Helvey was nominated for an Academy Award for his MFA thesis film, Kavi.

Facilities

Film industry companies, friends, and many of the school's famous alumni have joined forces to fund a world-class film and television complex at USC. Their gifts and ongoing support have enabled the School to build some of the top facilities and equipment of any film school anywhere, including:

• the George Lucas
  George Lucas
  George Walton Lucas, Jr. is an American film producer, screenwriter, and director, and entrepreneur. He is the founder, chairman and chief executive of Lucasfilm. He is best known as the creator of the space opera franchise Star Wars and the archaeologist-adventurer character Indiana Jones...
  
   Instructional Building
• the Steven Spielberg
  Steven Spielberg
  Steven Allan Spielberg KBE is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, video game designer, and studio entrepreneur. In a career of more than four decades, Spielberg's films have covered many themes and genres. Spielberg's early science-fiction and adventure films were seen as an...
  
   Music Scoring Stage
• the Marcia Lucas
  Marcia Lucas
  Marcia Lucas is an American film editor.In 1974, Lucas and Verna Fields were nominated for the Academy Award for Film Editing for their work on American Graffiti...
  
   Post-Production Building
• the Harold Lloyd
  Harold Lloyd
  Harold Clayton Lloyd, Sr. was an American film actor and producer, most famous for his silent comedies....
  
   Motion Picture Soundstage
• the Johnny Carson
  Johnny Carson
  John William "Johnny" Carson was an American television host and comedian, known as host of The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson for 30 years . Carson received six Emmy Awards including the Governor Award and a 1985 Peabody Award; he was inducted into the Television Academy Hall of Fame in 1987...
  
   Television Stage
• the Robert Zemeckis
  Robert Zemeckis
  Robert Lee Zemeckis is an American film director, producer and screenwriter. Zemeckis first came to public attention in the 1980s as the director of the comedic time-travel Back to the Future film series, as well as the Academy Award-winning live-action/animation epic Who Framed Roger Rabbit ,...
  
   Center for Digital Arts, home of the Student television station
  Student television station
  A student television station is a television station run by university, high or middle school students that primarily airs school/university news and in many cases, student-produced soap operas, entertainment shows, and other programming....
  
  , Trojan Vision
  Trojan Vision
  Trojan Vision is a student television station at the University of Southern California through the School of Cinematic Arts. Established in 1997 by the Annenberg School for Communication, Trojan Vision is a member of the Open Student Television Network , which televises student programming...
  
  .
• the Eileen Norris Cinema Theater
• the David L. Wolper
  David L. Wolper
  David Lloyd Wolper was an American television and film producer, responsible for shows such as Roots, The Thorn Birds, North & South, L.A. Confidential, and the film Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory...
  
   Center
• the Marilyn & Jeffrey Katzenberg
  Jeffrey Katzenberg
  Jeffrey Katzenberg is an American film producer and CEO of DreamWorks Animation. He is perhaps most famous for his period as chairman of The Walt Disney Company's film division, and for producing DreamWorks animated films such as Shrek, Antz, The Prince of Egypt, The Road to El Dorado, Chicken...
  
   Center for Animation
• the Louis B. Mayer
  Louis B. Mayer
  Louis Burt Mayer born Lazar Meir was an American film producer. He is generally cited as the creator of the "star system" within Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in its golden years. Known always as Louis B...
  
   Film and Television Study Center
• the Electronic Arts
  Electronic Arts
  Electronic Arts, Inc. is a major American developer, marketer, publisher and distributor of video games. Founded and incorporated on May 28, 1982 by Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer games industry and was notable for promoting the designers and programmers...
  
   Game Innovation Lab
• the 20th Century Fox
  20th Century Fox
  Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation — also known as 20th Century Fox, or simply 20th or Fox — is one of the six major American film studios...
  
   Soundstage

At the center of the new television complex is a statue of founder Douglas Fairbanks. He is seen holding a fencing weapon in one hand due to his strong ties with the USC Fencing Club

USC Fencing Club

The University of Southern California Fencing Club has a long and colorful history. Founded in 1926, the Club has been home to a number of world class fencers and has won multiple championships. The USC Fencing Club is one of many U.S...

. In addition to the new George Lucas and Steven Spielberg buildings, USC is also in the process of building new sound stages, animation, and sound facilities.

Areas of study

• Business of Entertainment (offered in conjunction with the Marshall School of Business
  Marshall School of Business
  The USC Marshall School of Business is a private research and academic institution at the University of Southern California. It is the largest of USC's 17 professional schools. The current Dean is James G. Ellis. In 1997 the school was renamed following a US$35 million donation from alumnus Gordon S...
  
   MBA Program)
• Critical Studies
  Film theory
  Film theory is an academic discipline that aims to explore the essence of the cinema and provides conceptual frameworks for understanding film's relationship to reality, the other arts, individual viewers, and society at large...
  
  
• John C. Hench Division of Animation and Digital Arts
  Division of Animation and Digital Arts
  The John C. Hench Division of Animation and Digital Arts at the USC School of Cinematic Arts, Los Angeles, United States, is an "international and multi-cultural program focusing on animation in all its forms." The program offers an undergraduate minor and major in animation, MFA, and Ph.D in...
  
  
• Interactive Media
  USC Interactive Media Division
  The University of Southern California's School of Cinematic Arts's Interactive Media Division first accepted students in 2002. In addition to coursework in film production, screenwriting, and animation, students in the division study across three disciplines within interactive media: immersive...
  
  
• Interdivisional Media Arts and Practice
  Media Arts and Practice
  The University of Southern California's School of Cinematic Arts's interdivisional Media Arts and Practice Ph.D. program first accepted students in 2007. iMAP is a practice-based Ph.D. program, in which students develop skills in both the theory and practice of media arts, doing doctoral level...
  
   PhD
  PHD
  PHD may refer to:*Ph.D., a doctorate of philosophy*Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*PHD finger, a protein sequence*PHD Mountain Software, an outdoor clothing and equipment company*PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...
  
   Program
• Producing
  Film producer
  A film producer oversees and delivers a film project to all relevant parties while preserving the integrity, voice and vision of the film. They will also often take on some financial risk by using their own money, especially during the pre-production period, before a film is fully financed.The...
  
  , under The Peter Stark Producing Program
• Production
  Filmmaking
  Filmmaking is the process of making a film, from an initial story, idea, or commission, through scriptwriting, casting, shooting, directing, editing, and screening the finished product before an audience that may result in a theatrical release or television program...
  
  
• Screenwriting
  Screenwriter
  Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...
  
  

Notable SCA alumni

See also List of University of Southern California people

• Amir Cyrus Ahanchian
• Sasha Alexander
  Sasha Alexander
  Sasha Alexander is an American actress. She is best known for several roles, including Gretchen Witter, the sister of Pacey Witter on Dawson's Creek; NCIS Special Agent Kate Todd in the first two seasons of NCIS; as Lucy in Yes Man ; and as Catherine in He's Just Not That Into You .She currently...
  
  
• Scott Alexander
  Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski
  Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski are a Hollywood screenwriting team...
  
  
• Elizabeth Allen
  Elizabeth Allen (director)
  Elizabeth Allen is an American director. Allen made her feature film directorial debut with Aquamarine, Fox 2000’s 2006 mermaid movie starring Sara Paxton and Emma Roberts...
  
  
• Thom Andersen
  Thom Andersen
  Thom Andersen is a filmmaker, film critic, and teacher. He attended Berkeley in the early 1960s and then returned to his hometown of Los Angeles to attend USC School of Cinematic Arts, where he studied with Arthur Knight and eventually assisted on Knight's project THE HISTORY OF SEX IN CINEMA...
  
  
• Judd Apatow
  Judd Apatow
  Judd Apatow is an American film producer, director, and screenwriter. He is well known for his work in comedy films, especially for films he has been involved with throughout the latter half of the 2000s. He is the founder of Apatow Productions, a film production company that also developed the...
  
  
• Gregg Araki
  Gregg Araki
  Gregg Araki is an American independent filmmaker. He is involved in New Queer Cinema.-Early life:Araki was born in Los Angeles but grew up in Santa Barbara, California...
  
  
• Aditya Assarat
  Aditya Assarat
  Aditya Assarat is a Thai independent film director, screenwriter, producer and cinematographer.-Early career:...
  
  
• Doug Atchison
  Doug Atchison
  Doug Atchison is an American motion picture director and screenwriter. He received the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Nicholl Fellowship for Akeelah and the Bee in 2000....
  
  
• Kelley Baker
  Kelley Baker
  Kelley Baker was born July 20, 1957. He is an independent filmmaker based in Portland, Oregon, United States and the writer and director of three indie feature films: Birddog , The Gas Cafe , and Kicking Bird...
  
  
• A.V. Balakrishnan
  A.V. Balakrishnan
  A.V. Balakrishnan is an American applied mathematician and professor at the University of California, Los Angeles. He is a recipient of the Richard E...
  
  
• John August
  John August
  John August is an American screenwriter and film director.  He also writes and maintains the popular screenwriting blog , and develops screenwriter-targeted software....
  
  
• Richard L. Bare
• Hal Barwood
  Hal Barwood
  Hal Barwood is an American game designer and game producer best known for his work on games based on the Indiana Jones license.Born in Hanover, New Hampshire, he studied art at Brown University and later attended the University of Southern California's School of Cinema-Television, where he met and...
  
  
• Walt Becker
  Walt Becker
  -External links:...
  
  
• David Bezmozgis
  David Bezmozgis
  David Bezmozgis is a Canadian writer and filmmaker.Born in Riga, Latvia, he came to Canada with his family when he was six. He graduated with a B.A. in English literature from McGill University. Bezmozgis received an M.F.A. from the University of Southern California's School of Cinema-Television....
  
  
• Laura Bialis
  Laura Bialis
  Laura Bialis is an American-Israeli filmmaker. She grew up in Los Angeles and Santa Barbara, California and is a graduate of San Marcos High School and Stanford University...
  
  
• Paul Harris Boardman
  Paul Harris Boardman
  Paul Harris Boardman is an American film producer and screenwriter, best known as the co-writer and producer of The Exorcism of Emily Rose . He also co-wrote the screenplays for Hellraiser: Inferno and Urban Legends: Final Cut , and worked on production rewrites of Dracula 2000, The Messengers,...
  
  
• Dominic Arizona Bonuccelli
  Dominic Arizona Bonuccelli
  Dominic Arizona Bonuccelli is a professional photographer and world traveler. Dominic spent several months on assignment co-hosting the travel TV series Lonely Planet: Roads Less Travelled, airing internationally beginning November 2009 on the National Geographic Adventure Channel, hunting down new...
  
  
• Charles Braverman
  Charles Braverman
  Charles "Chuck" Dell Braverman is an American film director, documentary filmmaker and producer...
  
  
• Mehcad Brooks
  Mehcad Brooks
  Mehcad Jason McKinley Brooks is an American actor and former fashion model.-Early life:Brooks was born and raised in Austin, Texas, where he attended L.C. Anderson High School...
  
  
• Norman Buckley
  Norman Buckley
  Norman L. Buckley is an American television director and editor best known for his work on The O.C., Chuck, Gossip Girl and Pretty Little Liars.-Early life:...
  
  
• Ben Burtt
  Ben Burtt
  Benjamin "Ben" Burtt, Jr. is an American sound designer who has worked on various films including: the Star Wars and Indiana Jones film series, Invasion of the Body Snatchers , E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial , and WALL-E...
  
  
• Trey Callaway
  Trey Callaway
  Trey Callaway is a film and television writer and producer, best known for writing the screenplay for the movie I Still Know What You Did Last Summer. He co-created and executive produced the science fiction television series Mercy Point on the UPN network. Trey performed as an actor in the series...
  
  
• John Carpenter
  John Carpenter
  John Howard Carpenter is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, editor, composer, and occasional actor. Although Carpenter has worked in numerous film genres in his four-decade career, his name is most commonly associated with horror and science fiction.- Early life :Carpenter was born...
  
  
• Nick Castle
  Nick Castle
  Nick Castle is an American actor, screenwriter and film director, best known for his role as Michael Myers in Halloween. He also co-wrote Escape from New York with his friend, John Carpenter.-Early life:...
  
  
• Art Clokey
  Art Clokey
  Arthur "Art" Clokey was a pioneer in the popularization of stop motion clay animation, beginning in 1955 with a film experiment called Gumbasia, influenced by his professor, Slavko Vorkapich, at the University of Southern California.After the Gumbasia project, Art Clokey and his wife Ruth came up...
  
  
• Jack Couffer
  Jack Couffer
  Jack Couffer A.S.C. is an American cinematographer and film and television director. Couffer has specialized on documentary films, often involving nature and animal cinematography...
  
  
• John Cox
  John Cox (screenwriter)
  John Cox is an American screenwriter born and currently residing in Los Angeles, CA. Cox co-wrote the film Boot Camp , and the most current draft of Sgt. Rock for Joel Silver and Warner Bros. He also wrote Virulents for New Regency and director John Moore...
  
  
• R. J. Cutler
• Mark Z. Danielewski
  Mark Z. Danielewski
  Mark Z. Danielewski, born March 5, 1966 in New York City, New York, is an American author, best known for his debut novel House of Leaves...
  
  
• Caleb Deschanel
  Caleb Deschanel
  Joseph Caleb Deschanel, A.S.C. is an American film cinematographer and film/television director.-Early life:Deschanel was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to a French father and an American mother, who raised him in her Quaker religion. He went to Severn School for high school...
  
  
• Thomas Del Ruth
  Thomas Del Ruth
  Thomas Del Ruth, A.S.C. is a cinematographer. He was born on May 1, 1942 in Beverly Hills, Los Angeles, in the United States of America. He is the son of film director Roy Del Ruth, and actress Winnie Lightner...
  
  
• Trygve Allister Diesen
  Trygve Allister Diesen
  Trygve Allister Diesen is a Norwegian film director, producer and screenwriter.Trygve Allister Diesen graduated from USC School of Cinematic Arts in Los Angeles. He started his professional career as a journalist in Kristiansand, Norway in 1986. Diesen has a comprehensive background in...
  
  
• Scott Derrickson
  Scott Derrickson
  Scott Derrickson is an American screenwriter, producer, and director. He lives in Los Angeles, California.- Biography :Derrickson was born and raised in Denver, Colorado. He graduated from Biola University with a B.A. in Humanities with an emphasis in literature and philosophy, a B.A. in...
  
  
• Craig Detweiler
  Craig Detweiler
  Craig Detweiler is a U.S. author, filmmaker and cultural commentator resident in Los Angeles, CA, who is employed as an associate professor of Communication at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California.-Early life and career:...
  
  
• Richard Edlund
  Richard Edlund
  Richard Edlund, A.S.C. is a multi-Academy Award-winning US special effects cinematographer.Edlund was born in Fargo, North Dakota. After first joining the Navy, he developed an interest in experimental film and attended the USC School of Cinematic Arts in the late 60s...
  
  
• Bobby Florsheim
  Bobby Florsheim
  Robert Florsheim is an American screenwriter, best known for co-writing The Passion Of The Ark with Josh Stolberg, . Their original script was reported by Daily Variety as the highest priced spec script ever sold by unproduced screenwriters...
  
  
• Frank E. Flowers
  Frank E. Flowers
  Frank E. Flowers is a Caymanian independent filmmaker, film director and screenwriter, writer and director of the award-winning 2003 short film Swallow and the 2004 feature motion picture Haven, the latter photographed on the island of Grand Cayman...
  
  
• Bob Gale
  Bob Gale
  Michael Robert "Bob" Gale is an American screenwriter who co-wrote the science fiction film Back to the Future with writing partner Robert Zemeckis, and the screenplays for the film's two sequels. Gale also co-produced all three films....
  
  
• Douglas Gayeton
  Douglas Gayeton
  Douglas Gayeton is an award-winning American multimedia artist, filmmaker, writer, and photographer who divides his time between a farm near Petaluma, California and Pistoia, a medieval Tuscan town....
  
  
• Scott Gimple
  Scott Gimple
  -Early life:Gimple grew up in Berkeley Heights, New Jersey and graduated from Governor Livingston High School. He graduated from the University of Southern California's School of Cinema-Television.-Film and television:...
  
  
• Alfred Gough
  Alfred Gough
  Alfred Gough III is an American screenwriter and producer.-Early life and career:Born in Leonardtown, Maryland, Gough graduated from St. Mary's Ryken High School and The Catholic University of America...
  
  
• David S. Goyer
  David S. Goyer
  David Samuel Goyer is an American screenwriter, film director and comic book writer.-Early life:Goyer was born and raised in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He attended Hebrew school and has described himself as "half Jewish"...
  
  

• James Gray
  James Gray (film director)
  James Gray is an American film director and screenwriter.-Life and career:Gray was born in New York City of Russian Jewish descent. His father was once an electronics contractor...
  
  
• Macy Gray
  Macy Gray
  Macy Gray is a Grammy Award-winning American R&B and soul singer-songwriter, record producer, and actress, famed for her distinctive raspy voice, and a singing style heavily influenced by Billie Holiday and Betty Davis.Gray has released five studio albums, with her fifth studio album, The Sellout,...
  
  
• Brian Grazer
  Brian Grazer
  Brian Thomas Grazer is an Academy Award-winning American film and television producer who co-founded Imagine Entertainment in 1986 with Ron Howard. Together they have produced many acclaimed films, including Apollo 13 and A Beautiful Mind .- Career :Brian Grazer began his career as a producer...
  
  
• Luke Greenfield
  Luke Greenfield
  Luke Greenfield is an American film director. Greenfield was born in Manhasset, New York and was raised in Westport, Connecticut. He is best known for directing The Animal and The Girl Next Door. In July 2007, he appeared as a guest judge on the filmmaking reality show On the Lot...
  
  
• Kevin Greutert
  Kevin Greutert
  -External links:...
  
  
• Ashley Greyson
  Ashley Greyson
  Ashley Greyson is a film and music video director, cinematographer, editor, and producer, who usually works with the band Hanson. He attended the USC School of Cinematic Arts....
  
  
• Javier Grillo-Marxuach
  Javier Grillo-Marxuach
  Javier "Javi" Grillo-Marxuach , born October 28, 1969 in San Juan, Puerto Rico, is a television screenwriter and producer, known for his work as writer and producer on the first two seasons of the ABC television series Lost, as well as other series including Charmed and Law and Order: Special...
  
  
• Lawrence Guterman
  Lawrence Guterman
  Lawrence "Larry" Guterman is a Canadian film director known for his work in companies like DreamWorks, Warner Bros. and Universal. He directed Cats & Dogs, Son of the Mask, and Back in Time...
  
  
• Conrad Hall
  Conrad Hall
  Conrad Lafcadio Hall, ASC was an American cinematographer from Papeete, Tahiti, French Polynesia. Named after writers Joseph Conrad and Lafcadio Hearn, he was best known for photographing films such as In Cold Blood, Cool Hand Luke, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, American Beauty, and Road to...
  
  
• Jane Hamsher
  Jane Hamsher
  Jane Hamsher is a US film producer, author, and blogger best known as the author of Killer Instinct, a memoir about co-producing the 1994 movie Natural Born Killers with Don Murphy and others, and as the founder and publisher of the politically progressive blog FireDogLake...
  
  
• Grant Heslov
  Grant Heslov
  Grant Heslov is an American actor, film producer, screenwriter and director.-Early life:Heslov was born in Los Angeles, into a Jewish family and was raised in the Palos Verdes area of Los Angeles. He attended Palos Verdes High School, the University of Southern California along with friend Tate...
  
  
• Matthew Ryan Hoge
  Matthew Ryan Hoge
  Matthew Ryan Hoge is an American writer and film director, known for writing and directing The United States of Leland .- Biography :...
  
  
• Sean Hood
  Sean Hood
  Sean Hood is an American screenwriter best known for horror films, and more recently, action/thrillers.-Early life:Hood graduated from Brown University, with a double major in pure mathematics and studio art, and then spent several years working in Hollywood as a set dresser, prop assistant and...
  
  
• Ron Howard
  Ron Howard
  Ronald William "Ron" Howard is an American actor, director, and producer. He came to prominence as a child actor, playing Opie Taylor in the sitcom The Andy Griffith Show for eight years, and later the teenaged Richie Cunningham in the sitcom Happy Days for six years...
  
  
• Martin Hynes
  Martin Hynes
  Martin Hynes is an American screenwriter, director, actor and producer of independent films.-Life and career:Hynes was born and raised in Eugene, Oregon and has a bachelors degree in history from Columbia University....
  
  
• James Ivory
  James Ivory (director)
  James Francis Ivory is an American film director, best known for the results of his long collaboration with Merchant Ivory Productions, which included both Indian-born film producer Ismail Merchant, and screenwriter Ruth Prawer Jhabvala...
  
  
• Joe Johnston
  Joe Johnston
  Joseph Eggleston "Joe" Johnston II is an American film director and former effects artist best known for such effects-driven movies as Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, Jumanji, The Rocketeer, Jurassic Park III, the period drama October Sky, The Wolfman, and Captain America: The First Avenger.- Life and...
  
  
• Rian Johnson
  Rian Johnson
  Rian Craig Johnson is an American writer and director, who won the Special Jury Prize for Originality of Vision at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival with his debut feature, Brick.-Background:...
  
  
• Larry Karaszewski
  Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski
  Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski are a Hollywood screenwriting team...
  
  
• Jonathan Ke Quan
• Richard Kelly
  Richard Kelly (director)
  James Richard Kelly is an American film director and writer, best known for writing and directing the cult classic Donnie Darko in 2001.-Early life:...
  
  
• Karey Kirkpatrick
  Karey Kirkpatrick
  Karey Kirkpatrick is an American screenwriter and director. His films include James and the Giant Peach, Space Jam, The Iron Giant, The Spiderwick Chronicles, Charlotte's Web and The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy adaptation. He has also directed the films, Imagine That starring Eddie Murphy as...
  
  
• Randal Kleiser
  Randal Kleiser
  John Randal Kleiser is an American film director and producer, perhaps best known for directing the 1978 musical film Grease.-Life and career:...
  
  
• Tom Klemesrud
• Tim Kring
  Tim Kring
  Richard Timothy "Tim" Kring is an American screenwriter and television producer, best known for his creation of the television series Strange World, Crossing Jordan, and Heroes.Kring is Jewish...
  
  
• Eric Kripke
  Eric Kripke
  Eric Kripke is an American television writer, director, and producer. He is best known for creating the television series Supernatural.-Biography:...
  
  
• Ken Kwapis
  Ken Kwapis
  Ken Kwapis is an American film and television director and screenwriter. He specialized in the single-camera sitcom in the 1990s and 2000s and has directed feature films such as Sesame Street Presents Follow That Bird, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, and He's Just Not That Into...
  
  
• Jon Landau
  Jon Landau (film producer)
  Jon Landau is an American film producer.Landau was born in New York City, New York, the son of Edie, a producer, and Ely A. Landau, a studio executive and producer, of non-practicing Jewish, German ancestry. He is one of the "famous faces" due to being a regular player on the online poker website...
  
  
• Alexander Sebastien Lee
• Chris Chan Lee
  Chris Chan Lee
  Chris Chan Lee is an Asian American filmmaker.After graduating from the USC School of Cinematic Arts in Los Angeles, California, Lee wrote/directed Yellow, an independently financed feature film about the harrowing grad night of eight Korean-American teens in Los Angeles that culminates in a...
  
  
• R. Eric Lieb
  R. Eric Lieb
  R. Eric Lieb is a writer and was a founding partner of Blacklight Transmedia. At Blacklight, Lieb focused on the creation and development of all film, video game, television, comic book and new media franchises.-Career history:...
  
  
• Doug Liman
  Doug Liman
  Douglas Eric "Doug" Liman is an American film director and producer best known for Swingers , The Bourne Identity , Mr. & Mrs. Smith , Jumper , and Fair Game .-Early life:...
  
  
• John Longenecker
  John Longenecker
  John Longenecker is an American film producer, Directors Guild of America member, screenwriter and cinematographer who produced the Academy Award winning live action short film, The Resurrection of Broncho Billy .-Biography:...
  
  
• George Lucas
  George Lucas
  George Walton Lucas, Jr. is an American film producer, screenwriter, and director, and entrepreneur. He is the founder, chairman and chief executive of Lucasfilm. He is best known as the creator of the space opera franchise Star Wars and the archaeologist-adventurer character Indiana Jones...
  
  
• Gregory Markopoulos
  Gregory Markopoulos
  Gregory J. Markopoulos was a Greek-American experimental filmmaker. Born in Toledo, Ohio to Greek immigrant parents, Markopoulos began making 8 mm films at an early age. He attended USC Film School in the late 1940s, and went on to become a co-founder — with Jonas Mekas, Shirley Clarke, Stan...
  
  
• Richard Martini
  Richard martini
  Richard Martini is an award-winning American film director, producer, screenwriter and free lance journalist. He graduated Magna Cum Laude from Boston University with a degree in Humanities, attended USC Film School and is a 2008 graduate of the Master of Professional Writing Program at...
  
  
• John Milius
  John Milius
  John Frederick Milius is an American screenwriter, director, and producer of motion pictures.-Early life:Milius was born in St. Louis, Missouri, the son of Elizabeth and William Styx Milius, who was a shoe manufacturer. Milius attempted to join the Marine Corps in the late 1960s, but was rejected...
  
  
• Miles Millar
  Miles Millar
  -Early life and Career:Millar was educated at Claremont Fan Court School, and is a graduate of Christ's College, Cambridge, where he was Chairman of Cambridge University Conservative Association.....
  
  
• F. Hudson Miller
  F. Hudson Miller
  F. Hudson Miller is a motion picture sound editor and designer for feature films in Hollywood California.-Biography:A graduate of the Interlochen Arts Academy in Interlochen, Michigan, Miller earned a BA in American Studies from Grinnell College in Grinnell, Iowa...
  
  
• Derek Mio
  Derek Mio
  Derek Mio is an American film and TV actor. He attended USC School of Cinematic Arts. He is a fourth-generation Japanese American.-Acting career:...
  
  
• Stephen Mirrione
  Stephen Mirrione
  Stephen Mirrione is an American film editor. He won an Academy Award for his editing of the film Traffic .-Life and career:...
  
  
• Walter Murch
  Walter Murch
  Walter Scott Murch is an American film editor and sound designer.-Early life:Murch was born in New York City, New York, the son of Katharine and Canadian-born Walter Tandy Murch , a painter. He went to The Collegiate School, a private preparatory school in Manhattan, from 1949 to 1961...
  
  
• Don Murphy
  Don Murphy
  Don Murphy is an American film producer who produced Natural Born Killers and many other films, including Transformers and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.-Personal background:...
  
  
• Tom Neff
  Tom Neff
  Thomas Linden Neff, known as Tom Neff, is a film executive, director and producer, born in Chicago, Illinois. Currently, he lives in Nashville, Tennessee.-Education:Neff received his Bachelor of Arts from Lawrence University with a major in English...
  
  
• Laura Neri
  Laura Neri
  Laura Neri is a director of Greek and Italian origins. Born in Brussels, Belgium, she graduated from the USC School of Cinematic Arts in Los Angeles with an MFA in Film Production.Laura Neri was born of a Greek mother and an Italian father...
  
  
• Dan O'Bannon
  Dan O'Bannon
  Daniel Thomas "Dan" O'Bannon was an American motion picture screenwriter, director and occasional actor, usually in the science fiction and horror genres.-Early life and career:...
  
  
• Randy Olson
  Randy Olson
  Randy Olson is a scientist-turned-filmmaker who earned his Ph.D. in Biology from Harvard University and became a tenured professor of marine biology at the University of New Hampshire before changing careers by moving to Hollywood and entering film school at the University of Southern California...
  
  

• Tom Oesch
  Tom Oesch
  Tom Oesch is a Swiss music video director who works in Hollywood, California.- Biography :Oesch grew up in Rebstein, a small rural town in eastern Switzerland, as the son of a doctor. After attending a midnight screening of the movie Jurassic Park in 1993 he decided that he wanted to make movies...
  
  
• Richard Outten
  Richard Outten
  Richard Outten is an American screenwriter who works in both motion pictures and television. After receiving his MFA from the USC School of Cinematic Arts, he co-authored , the screenplay to the award-winning animated film Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland. Other motion picture credits...
  
  
• Chris Parson
  Chris Parson
  Chris Parson is an American voiceover actor and a 2001 graduate of the USC School of Cinema Television . Parson began his career working primarily as an assistant in talent management while still a student, and worked briefly in digital artist management for Sony Pictures Imageworks.It was after...
  
  
• Paula Patton
  Paula Patton
  Paula Maxine Patton is an American actress. She is mostly known for her appearances in the films Idlewild , Déjà Vu , Mirrors , Swing Vote , Precious , Just Wright , and Jumping the Broom .-Early life and career:Patton was born in Los Angeles, to Joyce , a European-American...
  
  
• Sam Peckinpah
  Sam Peckinpah
  David Samuel "Sam" Peckinpah was an American filmmaker and screenwriter who achieved prominence following the release of the Western epic The Wild Bunch...
  
   (drama major)
• Charlie Pecoraro
  Charlie Pecoraro
  Charlie Pecoraro is an Italian American stage, television, and film actor.-Biography:Charlie Pecoraro was born into a family of noted performers and musicians. He is the son of jazz guitarist Charles P...
  
  
• Brian Wayne Peterson
  Brian Wayne Peterson
  Brian Wayne Peterson is a screenwriter and television producer. He wrote the script for 1999 film But I'm a Cheerleader and has worked on many episodes of Smallville as writer and producer since 2002...
  
  
• Shawn Piller
  Shawn Piller
  Shawn Piller is a principal/executive producer at Piller/Segan/Shepherd, an independent content production company.- Piller/Segan/Shepherd :...
  
  
• Stu Pollard
  Stu Pollard
  Stu Pollard, born January 26, 1967 in Louisville, Kentucky, is an American film producer, writer and director.In his youth, Pollard attended and graduated from Kentucky Country Day School and Georgetown University...
  
  
• Kevin Reynolds
• Ben Ripley
  Ben Ripley
  Ben Ripley is an American screenwriter best known for writing the science-fiction thriller Source Code directed by Duncan Jones. Ripley is a graduate of Stanford University and the University of Southern California's USC School of Cinema-Television....
  
  
• Jay Roach
  Jay Roach
  Matthew Jay Roach is an American film director and producer, best known for directing the Austin Powers films and Meet the Parents.-Life and career:...
  
  
• Shonda Rhimes
  Shonda Rhimes
  Shonda Rhimes is an American screenwriter, director and producer. Rhimes is best known as the creator, head writer, and executive producer of acclaimed television series Grey's Anatomy and its spin-off Private Practice. In May 2007, Rhimes was named one of Time magazine's 100 Time 100 people who...
  
  
• Barry Rubinow
  Barry Rubinow
  Barry Rubinow is a film executive and editor, born in Glen Rock, New Jersey, a suburb of New York City. Currently, he lives in West Hills, California.-Education:...
  
  
• Gary Rydstrom
  Gary Rydstrom
  Gary Roger Rydstrom is an American sound designer and director. He has won seven Academy Awards for his work in sound for movies.-Career:...
  
  
• Walter Salles
  Walter Salles
  Walter Moreira Salles, Jr. is a Brazilian filmmaker and film producer of international prominence.-Life and career:Salles was born in Rio de Janeiro. He is the son of Elizinha Goncalves and Walter Moreira Salles, a Brazilian banker and ambassador, and the brother of João Moreira Salles, also a...
  
  
• Edward Saxon
  Edward Saxon
  -Early life:Saxon was raised in St. Louis, Missouri, and educated at Kirkwood High School from 1972 to 1976, and McGill University from 1976 to 1980. He then studied at The Peter Stark Producing Program at the USC School of Cinema-Television. While at McGill, he founded the Tuesday Night Cafe...
  
  
• Josh Schwartz
  Josh Schwartz
  -Film school at USC:In 1995, Schwartz realized his boyhood dream of attending film school to study screen and television writing at the University of Southern California...
  
  
• Leigh Scott
  Leigh Scott
  Leigh Scott is an American film director, writer, producer, actor and cinematographer.- Early life and career :...
  
  
• Ben Shedd
  Ben Shedd
  Ben Shedd has been a professional film and video director, producer, and writer since 1970. He has won an Academy Award.He earned a degree from the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts in 1973....
  
  
• Stacey Sher
  Stacey Sher
  -Early life:Born in New York but raised in Fort Lauderdale, Sher is a graduate of University of Southern California's Peter Stark Producing Program.-Movie career:...
  
  
• Christine Shin
  Christine Shin
  -Background:After growing up in Korea, Shin relocated in her adolescence to the United States. Already aware that she wanted to be involved in film, Shin attended University of Wisconsin and USC School of Cinema-Television, receiving respectively aa B.A...
  
  
• Sofia Shinas
  Sofia Shinas
  Sofia Shinas is a Canadian television and film actress and recording artist. She is best known for her hit single, "The Message", and her role as Brandon Lee's murdered fiancée, Shelly, in The Crow.-Music:...
  
  
• Sigurjón Sighvatsson
  Sigurjón Sighvatsson
  Sigurjón Sighvatsson , also known as Joni Sighvatsson, is a veteran Hollywood film producer and businessman. Currently he is the principal of Palomar Pictures, an independent film production company in Los Angeles. Palomar's current project Killer Elite was released September 23rd, 2011...
  
  
• Bryan Singer
  Bryan Singer
  Bryan Singer is an American film director and film producer. Singer won critical acclaim for his work on The Usual Suspects, and is especially well-known among fans of the science fiction and superhero genres for his work on the X-Men films and Superman Returns.-Early life:Singer was born in New...
  
  
• Dror Soref
  Dror Soref
  Dror Soref is a filmmaker who started his career directing music videos for a young "Weird Al" Yankovic in 1983, shortly after attending USC Film School. Soref later directed Platinum Blonde, an inspirational short film that landed him a Housekeeping Deal at Paramount Studios...
  
  
• John Singleton
• Kevin Stea
  Kevin Stea
  Kevin Alexander Stea is an American dancer, choreographer, actor, singer, director and model.He was the assistant choreographer and dance captain for Madonna's Blond Ambition Tour and appeared in the documentary about it, Madonna: Truth or Dare in 1990/1.In January 1992, along with dancers Oliver...
  
  
• Adam Stein
  Adam Stein
  Adam Stein is an American film director, writer and editor working in Los Angeles, California.Stein graduated from Harvard University and attended film school at the University of Southern California, with a focus on directing...
  
  
• Tim Story
  Tim Story (film director)
  Timothy Kevin Story is an African-American film director. Born in Los Angeles, California, he attended Westchester High School in Los Angeles with jazz pianist Eric Reed and actresses Regina King and Nia Long. He was senior class president at Westchester High. He graduated from the University of...
  
  
• Stephen Sommers
  Stephen Sommers
  Stephen Sommers is an American screenwriter and film director, best known for The Mummy and its sequel, The Mummy Returns. He also directed Disney's live action version of Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book, the action/horror film Van Helsing, and the 2009 film G.I...
  
  
• Guido Mina di Sospiro
  Guido Mina di Sospiro
  Guido Mina di Sospiro is a novelist and journalist born in Buenos Aires, Argentina but raised in Italy who lives in the United States.Mina di Sospiro's novel "The Story of Yew" , published in the UK, has been translated into many languages, as has "From the River", the memoirs of a mighty river...
  
  
• David H. Steinberg
  David H. Steinberg
  David H. Steinberg is a screenwriter and film director. He wrote the screenplays for American Pie 2, Slackers, National Lampoon's Barely Legal, and American Pie Presents: The Book of Love.-Career:...
  
  
• Stephan Szpak-Fleet
  Stephan Szpak-Fleet
  Stephan Szpak-Fleet was born on April 25, 1979 in Warsaw, Poland to Alina Szpak and Robert Fleet. As a child he starred in three feature films: "Brothers of the Wilderness", "Legend of the White Horse" and "The Friends of Harry." Stephan also worked regularly as a commercial actor and in the...
  
  
• Jon Turteltaub
  Jon Turteltaub
  Jonathan Charles "Jon" Turteltaub is an American film director and producer. He is a graduate of Wesleyan University and the USC School of Cinematic Arts...
  
  
• Lee Unkrich
  Lee Unkrich
  Lee Unkrich is an American director and film editor. He is a longtime member of the creative team at Pixar, where he started in 1994 as a film editor. He later began directing, first as co-director of Toy Story 2...
  
  
• Christopher Vogler
  Christopher Vogler
  Christopher Vogler is a Hollywood development executive best known for his guide for screenwriters, The Writer's Journey: Mythic Structure For Writers.-Career:...
  
  
• Matthew Weiner
  Matthew Weiner
  Matthew Weiner is an American writer, director and producer of television drama. He is the creator, executive producer, head writer, and show runner of the AMC television series Mad Men. He is also noted for his work on the HBO series The Sopranos, on which he served as a writer and producer...
  
  
• John Wells
  John Wells (TV producer)
  John Marcum Wells is an American theater and television producer, writer and director. He is best known for his role as executive producer and show runner of the television series ER, Third Watch, and The West Wing. His company, John Wells Productions, is currently based at Warner Bros. studios in...
  
  
• Alexander Winn
  Alexander Winn
  Alexander Winn is an American writer, producer, and director of live-action and machinima films. Winn is best known as one of the two founding members of Edgeworks Entertainment, and as the writer, director, co-producer and composer of the award-winning Halo machinima series The Codex Series,...
  
  
• Freddie Wong
  Freddie Wong
  Freddie Wong is an American filmmaker, musician, VFX expert and e-Sports player. He maintains two popular YouTube channels, freddiew and freddiew2. He is the older brother of fellow YouTuber Jimmy Wong.- Biography :...
  
  
• Brandon Laatsch
• Robert Zemeckis
  Robert Zemeckis
  Robert Lee Zemeckis is an American film director, producer and screenwriter. Zemeckis first came to public attention in the 1980s as the director of the comedic time-travel Back to the Future film series, as well as the Academy Award-winning live-action/animation epic Who Framed Roger Rabbit ,...
  
  
• Laura Ziskin
  Laura Ziskin
  Laura Ellen Ziskin was an American film producer. In 1990, Ziskin was the sole executive producer of the hit comedy Pretty Woman...
  
  
• Jon Chu
  Jon Chu
  Jonathan Murray "Jon" Chu is an American film director and screenwriter best known for directing the movies Step Up 2: The Streets, Step Up 3D and Justin Bieber: Never Say Never. Chu is an alumnus of the University of Southern California School of Cinema-Television...
  
  

Notable faculty members and instructors

• Danny Bilson
  Danny Bilson
  Daniel "Danny" Bilson is an American writer, director, and producer of movies, television, videogames, and comic books. With his writing partner Paul DeMeo, Danny Bilson wrote the movie The Rocketeer , the video game James Bond 007: Everything or Nothing , the television series The Sentinel ,...
  
  
• Mitchell Block
  Mitchell Block
  Mitchell Block is an American filmmaker whose 2010 film Poster Girl was nominated for Academy Award for Best Documentary and who Executive Produced the Academy Award winning documentary short film Big Mama for HBO in 2000....
  
  
• Mark Bolas
  Mark Bolas
  Mark Bolas is a researcher exploring perception, agency, and intelligence. He is an Associate Professor of Interactive Media in the USC Interactive Media Division, USC School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California, Director of their Interactive Narrative and Immersive...
  
  
• Peter Bonerz
  Peter Bonerz
  Peter Bonerz is an American actor and director who is best known as the character Dr. Jerry Robinson on The Bob Newhart Show....
  
  
• Todd Boyd
  Todd Boyd
  Dr. Todd Boyd, American academic, is the Katherine and Frank Price Endowed Chair for the Study of Race and Popular Culture and Professor of Critical Studies in the USC School of Cinematic Arts. Boyd is an author, media commentator, producer and consultant...
  
  
• Trey Callaway
  Trey Callaway
  Trey Callaway is a film and television writer and producer, best known for writing the screenplay for the movie I Still Know What You Did Last Summer. He co-created and executive produced the science fiction television series Mercy Point on the UPN network. Trey performed as an actor in the series...
  
  
• Drew Casper
  Drew Casper
  Joseph Andrew "Drew" Casper is a Professor of Critical Studies in the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California and considered to be an authority on American film from World War II to the present. While a Ph.D. student at USC, Dr. Casper's mentor, Irwin Blacker, died...
  
  
• Frank Daniel
  Frank Daniel
  Frank Daniel was a film director, producer and screenwriter born in Kolín, Czechoslovakia . He is known for developing the sequence paradigm of screenwriting.-Life:...
  
  
• Mar Elepano
  Mar Elepano
  Mariano "Mar" Elepano is a Filipino American independent filmmaker, teacher, and has been the production supervisor of the John C. Hench Division of Animation and Digital Arts, USC School of Cinematic Arts since 1993....
  
  
• John A. Ferraro
  John A. Ferraro
  John A. Ferraro was an American actor, academic, stage director and television director. His credits as a director included Sesame Street, as well as Broadway and off-Broadway plays....
  
  
• Verna Fields
  Verna Fields
  Verna Fields was an American film editor, film and television sound editor, educator, and entertainment industry executive. In the first phase of her career, from 1954 through to about 1970, Fields mostly worked on smaller projects that gained little recognition. She was the sound editor for...
  
  
• Scott Fisher
  Scott Fisher (technologist)
  Scott Fisher is Professor and Chair of the Interactive Media Division in the USC School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California, and a Fellow of the Annenberg Center for Communication there...
  
  
• Rachel Feldman
  Rachel Feldman
  Rachel Feldman is an American director of film and television and screenwriter of television films.-Life and career:Born in in New York City, New York, Feldman began her career as a child actor performing on Broadway....
  
  
• Robert L. Freedman
  Robert L. Freedman
  Robert L. Freedman is an American screenwriter, playwright, and lyricist. He is probably best known for his teleplays for Rodgers and Hammerstein's Cinderella and the acclaimed 2001 miniseries Life with Judy Garland: Me and My Shadows, for which he was nominated for Emmy Awards as both writer and...
  
  
• Anne Friedberg
  Anne Friedberg
  Anne Friedberg was Chair of the Critical Studies Division in the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California and President-elect of the Society for Cinema and Media Studies. An author, historian and theorist of modern media culture, Friedberg received her PhD. in Cinema...
  
  
• Nina Foch
  Nina Foch
  Nina Foch was a Dutch-born American actress and leading lady in many 1940s and 1950s films.- Personal life :...
  
  
• Tracy Fullerton
  Tracy Fullerton
  Tracy Fullerton is an American game designer, educator and writer. She is currently an Associate Professor in the USC Interactive Media Division of the USC School of Cinematic Arts and Director of the Electronic Arts Game Innovation Lab. In December of 2008, she was installed as the holder of...
  
  
• Maureen Furniss
  Maureen Furniss
  Maureen Ruth Furniss is a writer, animation historian, animation theorist, critic, professor, and president of the Society for Animation Studies...
  
  
• Dan Gordon
  Dan Gordon (screenwriter)
  -Career:Dan Gordon graduated from UCLA as a film and television major, and went on to write screenplays including Passenger 57 , Wyatt Earp , Murder in the First , The Assignment and The Hurricane , as well as several novels.His play, Irena's Vow, premiered at the Baruch Performing Arts Center,...
  
  
• Mark Jonathan Harris
  Mark Jonathan Harris
  Mark Jonathan Harris is an American documentary filmmaker probably best known for his films Into the Arms of Strangers: Stories of the Kindertransport and The Long Way Home...
  
  
• Tomlinson Holman
  Tomlinson Holman
  Tomlinson M. Holman is an American film theorist, audio engineer, and inventor of film technologies, notably the Lucasfilm THX sound system. He developed the world's first 10.2 sound system. Earlier, Holman developed what was known as the Holman Preamplifier, for the Apt Corporation. He holds a...
  
  
• Gordy Hoffman
  Gordy Hoffman
  Gordy Hoffman is a US writer and director.Gordy is the older brother of actor Philip Seymour Hoffman, and the son of Marilyn O'Connor, a judge in Rochester, New York...
  
  
• Sean Hood
  Sean Hood
  Sean Hood is an American screenwriter best known for horror films, and more recently, action/thrillers.-Early life:Hood graduated from Brown University, with a double major in pure mathematics and studio art, and then spent several years working in Hollywood as a set dresser, prop assistant and...
  
  
• Jerry Lewis
  Jerry Lewis
  Jerry Lewis is an American comedian, actor, singer, film producer, screenwriter and film director. He is best known for his slapstick humor in film, television, stage and radio. He was originally paired up with Dean Martin in 1946, forming the famed comedy team of Martin and Lewis...
  
  
• Leonard Maltin
  Leonard Maltin
  Leonard Maltin is an American film and animated film critic and historian, author of several mainstream books on cinema, focusing on nostalgic, celebratory narratives.-Personal life:...
  
  
• Michael Naimark
  Michael Naimark
  Michael Naimark is a media artist and researcher who often explores “place representation.”- Biography :Naimark helped found a number of prominent research labs including the MIT Media Laboratory , the Atari Research Lab , the Apple Multimedia Lab , Lucasfilm Interactive , and Interval Research...
  
  
• Christine Panushka
  Christine Panushka
  Christine Panushka is an independent filmmaker, freelance animator, artist and teacher. She is currently a Professor in the John Hench Division of Animation and Digital Arts at the USC School of Cinematic Arts....
  
  
• Mark Pesce
  Mark Pesce
  - Biography :September 1980, Pesce attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology , for a Bachelor of Science degree, but left in June 1982 to pursue opportunities in the newly emerging high-technology industry. He worked as an Engineer for the next few years, developing prototype firmware and...
  
  
• Gene Polito
  Gene Polito
  Eugene "Gene" Emmanuel Polito was an American cinematographer, mechanical engineer and academic. His numerous of film and television credits included Futureworld, Up in Smoke and Lost in Space....
  
  
• Abraham Polonsky
  Abraham Polonsky
  Abraham Lincoln Polonsky was an American film director, Academy-Award-nominated screenwriter, essayist, and novelist blacklisted by the Hollywood movie studios in the 1950s, in the midst of the McCarthy era.-Early life:...
  
  
• Howard Rosenberg
  Howard Rosenberg
  Howard Rosenberg is a retired TV critic for the Los Angeles Times. He worked there for 25 years and won a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism. In recent years he has written the book No Time to Think: The Menace of Media Speed and the 24-Hour News Cycle with Charles S. Feldman and compiled an anthology of...
  
  
• Kathy Smith
  Kathy Smith (filmmaker)
  Kathy Smith is an Australian independent filmmaker, painter, photographer, and Associate Professor with the John C. Hench Division of Animation and Digital Arts , USC School of Cinematic Arts. She has been the Chair of DADA since 2004....
  
  
• Chris Swain
  Chris Swain
  Chris Swain is an American game designer, entrepreneur, and professor. He is the founder and CEO of , a venture-funded game developer creating a transmedia social games...
  
  
• Jordan Weisman
  Jordan Weisman
  Jordan Weisman is an American game designer, author, and serial entrepreneur who has founded four major game design companies, each in a different game genre and segment of the industry.-Biography:...
  
  
• Paul Wolff
  Paul Wolff
  Paul Wolff is a screenwriter, actor, producer and popular screenwriting instructor at the University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts. He has taught at the university for over fourteen years...
  
  
• Slavko Vorkapić
  Slavko Vorkapic
  Slavko Vorkapić , was a Serbian-American film director and editor, former Dean of USC Film School, painter, and a prominent figure of modern cinematography and film art.-Early life:Slavko Vorkapić was born on March 17, 1894, in...
  
  

External links

• USC School of Cinematic Arts website
• USC Summer Film Program
• SCA Community
• Hugh M. Hefner Moving Image Archive
• Warner Bros. Archives
• USC School of Cinematic Arts Copyright Policy
• Entertainment Technology Center