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Andrew Bergman

 
Writer: Andrew Bergman
  • Born: Feb 20, 1945 in Queens, New York City, New York
  • Occupation: Writer, Director
  • Active: '80s-'90s
  • Major Genres: Comedy
  • Career Highlights: Blazing Saddles, Fletch, The In-Laws
  • First Major Screen Credit: Blazing Saddles (1974)

Biography

The son of a New York Daily News columnist, director/writer Andrew Bergman attended Harper College and the University of Wisconsin-Madison. After receiving his doctorate in teaching in 1970, Bergman established his reputation as a "progressive" film historian / sociologist with his 1971 overview of 1930s films, We're In the Money. Bergman was hired as a "youth contact" p.r. man for United Artists; it was his job to clue the studio in as to what was "hot" amongst the young. Following his Broadway playwriting bow with Social Security, Bergman received his first screenwriting credit for Mel Brooks' blockbuster western parody Blazing Saddles (a later attempt by Bergman to write a genre spoof on his own, Rhapsody of Crime, died on the vine). After the success of his screenplay and story for 1979's The In-Laws, Bergman was given an opportunity to direct the Madison Avenue satire So Fine (1981). Forming his own production company with Michael Lobell, Bergman has written and/or directed such moneymakers as Fletch (1985), The Freshman (1990), Honeymoon in Vegas and It Could Happen to You (1994). Keeping Andrew Bergman "honest" have been such occasional non-hits as the 1991 soap-opera lampoon Soapdish and the weekly TV fiasco The Dictator (1992). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
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Andrew Bergman is an American screenwriter, film director, and novelist. New York magazine in 1985 dubbed him "The Unknown King of Comedy". [1]

Born in 1945, Bergman graduated from Binghamton University and earned a Ph.D. in American history from the University of Wisconsin. His dissertation, a study of Depression-era Hollywood films, was published in 1971 by NYU Press under the title We're In the Money: Depression America and Its Films. He wrote the original screenplay (titled Tex X) that served as the basis for Mel Brooks's classic Blazing Saddles, and was among the co-writers who adapted it into its final state. Since then, he has written or co-written the cult classics The In-Laws, Fletch, and Soapdish; written and directed The Freshman, Honeymoon in Vegas and It Could Happen To You; written and produced Striptease with Demi Moore; and directed the Jacqueline Susann biopic Isn't She Great.

Bergman has written four novels: The Big Kiss-Off of 1944, Hollywood and LeVine, Tender Is LeVine, and Sleepless Nights. He also wrote the Broadway comedy, Social Security.

In 2007, Bergman received the Ian McLellan Hunter Award for Lifetime Achievement in Writing from the Writers Guild of America. He lives in New York City with his wife and has two grown sons.


 
 
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