producer

Happy Birthday: Joel Silver

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joelsilverHappy Birthday producer Joel Silver

Born: July 14, 1952 in South Orange, New Jersey, USA

Married to:
Karyn Fields (10 July 1999 – present) (1 child)

As flamboyant as any character in his movies, Joel Silver can be credited along with Jerry Bruckheimer as practically reinventing the action film genre in the 1980s. Born in New Jersey, he attended the New York University Film School.

Joel Silver pioneered the practice of shooting action movies in Australia with the “Matrix” films, and has been credited with either inventing or reinventing the careers of Eddie Murphy, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Steven Seagal. He was mentioned in Halle Berry’s Academy Award acceptance speech. Other credits include non-action pictures, ranging from Xanadu (1980) and Weird Science (1985) to HBO’s long-running TV series, Tales from the Crypt (1989).

Caricatured in Grand Canyon (1991), True Romance (1993), and I’ll Do Anything (1994)

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Happy Birthday: Merv Griffin (1925–2007)

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mervgriffin.jpgHappy Birthday producer Merv Griffin (1925–2007)

Born: July 6, 1925 in San Mateo, California, USA

Died: August 12, 2007 (age 82) in Los Angeles, California, USA

QUOTES:

I’ve been in the public eye for more than fifty years as Merv Griffin, not as somebody else’s creation. I’ve never pretended to be someone I wasn’t. If there was anything really important that people didn’t know about me by now, then I would have to be world’s greatest actor. Forget Brando, forget Hoffman, forget DeNiro… I would have to be the best.
(on what he would like his headstone to read) Stay tuned.

If the host is sitting there thinking about his next joke, he isn’t listening.

You know I really never get down. My philosophy is that you have to constantly be turning the page, which prevents me from getting caught up in any negativity. It’s all about change for me. I just keep moving and enjoy the ride.

I tell everybody that I’m a quatre-sexual: I will do anything with anybody for a quarter. – when asked if he was gay

I worked for Mark Goodson early in my career and he was like the

Godfather of game shows. I asked him if it was a business worth getting into. He responded, “If you have an original idea, there’s no format in television that costs less and brings in more profit.” After I had some success, he reached out and congratulated me on “Wheel” and “Jeopardy!”, saying that I took his advice to heart. He was a visionary and a gentleman, a rare find in showbiz.

Happy Birthday: Kathleen Kennedy

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kathleenkennedy.jpgHappy Birthday producer Kathleen Kennedy

Born: June 5, 1953 in Berkeley, California, USA

Married to: Frank Marshall (1987 – present) (2 children)

Has been nominated for 8 Academy Awards for Producing.

QUOTES:

Believe and set your sights on the fact that you can do it. It’s certainly a goal any woman can have, just like any man.

But what I always find interesting is when you take the areas of writing, producing and directing. I don’t think there’s a great deal of discrimination — although I’m completely perplexed and confused as to why there aren’t more women. For instance, if we’re looking for new, young directors, which is something we do all the time, we certainly never go look at films because they’re directed by a man or a woman. We look at films because they are winning awards, they’re good, and it has nothing to do with gender. And women certainly have equal opportunity to get into a university like UCLA or USC, to get into the film department, to take the same courses to allow them to make films, to deal with a whole gamut of subject matter, and yet I don’t know what happens. There’s something that happens in the process of getting there that seems to turn many women away.