Brian Grazer

Brian Grazer
Grazer at the 2011 Tribeca Film Festival Vanity Fair party
Born	Brian Thomas Grazer July 12, 1951 (1951-07-12) Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Occupation	Producer (film and television)
Years active	1978–present
Spouse	Theresa McKay Corki Corman Gigi Levangie Grazer (1997-2007)

Brian Thomas Grazer (born July 12, 1951) is an American film and television producer who co-founded Imagine Entertainment in 1986 with Ron Howard. Together they have produced many films, including Apollo 13 (1995) and A Beautiful Mind (2001).

Career

Brian Grazer began his career as a producer developing television projects. While executive-producing TV pilots at Paramount Pictures in the early 1980s, Grazer met current long-time friend and business partner Ron Howard. He produced his first feature-film, Night Shift, in 1982, directed by Howard. Grazer and Howard teamed up again for Splash in 1984, which Grazer produced and co-wrote, the latter earning him an Oscar nomination for Best Original Screenplay of 1984. In 1986, Grazer and Howard co-founded Imagine Entertainment, which continues to be one of Hollywood's most prolific and successful production companies. Over the years, Grazer’s films and TV shows have been nominated for a total of 43 Academy Awards and 131 Emmys. At the same time, his movies have generated more than $13.5 billion in worldwide theatrical, music and video grosses.

Grazer’s early film successes include Parenthood (1989) and Backdraft (1991). He produced Apollo 13 (1995), for which he won the Producers' Guild’s Daryl F. Zanuck Motion Picture Producer of the Year Award as well as an Oscar nomination for Best Picture of 1995.

In 1998, Grazer earned two major honors that attested to his fame: he was given his own star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and made a cameo appearance on the animated series The Simpsons.

In 2001, Grazer won an Academy Award for Best Picture for A Beautiful Mind, which also took home Oscars for Best Supporting Actress (Jennifer Connelly), Best Director (Ron Howard), and Best Adapted Screenplay (Akiva Goldsman).

In 2002, Grazer’s 8 Mile was released. It proved not only to be a huge box office hit, but also the first film with a rap song to win a Best Original Song Oscar for Eminem’s "Lose Yourself".^{[citation needed]}

Grazer also produced the film adaptation of Peter Morgan’s play Frost/Nixon, directed by Ron Howard. Frost/Nixon (2008) was nominated for five Academy Awards including Best Picture.

Grazer’s productions span over a quarter-century and almost the full spectrum of movie genres. His comedies include Boomerang (1992), The Nutty Professor (1996), How The Grinch Stole Christmas (2000), Intolerable Cruelty (2003), and The Dilemma (2011). He has also produced many dramatic thrillers to include Inside Man (2006), The Da Vinci Code (2006), American Gangster (2007), Changeling (2008), Angels and Demons (2009), Robin Hood (2010), and Cowboys and Aliens (2011). His recently released films include J. Edgar, the Clint Eastwood-directed biopic of J. Edgar Hoover, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Tower Heist, starring Ben Stiller and Eddie Murphy andRestless, directed by Gus Van Sant.

Grazer’s Imagine Entertainment’s television series include Sports Night, Felicity, Arrested Development, 24, Friday Night Lights, Parenthood, and Lie To Me.

Additional awards

In 2001, Grazer was honored as the recipient of the Producers Guild of America's David O. Selznick Lifetime Achievement Award in Theatrical Motion Pictures
March 6, 2003, Grazer received the ShoWest Lifetime Achievement Award
May 2007, Grazer was listed as one of Time Magazine’s “100 Most Influential People in the World”
January 2009, Grazer and Howard received the Producers Guild of America Milestone Award
November 2009, Grazer and Howard received New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts Big Apple Award
May 2010, Grazer and Howard received the Simon Wiesenthal Center Humanitarian Award
February 2011, Grazer received the MPSE 2011 Filmmaker Award

Personal life

Grazer was born in Los Angeles, California to Arlene and Thomas Grazer. He is the older brother of Nora Beth Grazer (1952) and of actor/director Gavin Grazer (1956)^{[citation needed]}.

He was married to Theresa McKay from 1972-79. From 1982-1992 he was married to Corki Corman Grazer. They have son Riley (1986) and daughter Sage (1988). He was married to Gigi Levangie from September 20, 1997 to June 8, 2007. They have two sons together, Thomas (11/15/99) and Patrick (9/27/04).

Grazer currently resides in Santa Monica, California.

External links

• http://www.imagine-entertainment.com
• Brian Grazer at the Internet Movie Database
• Link label