Academy Award-winning producer Bruce Cohen recently launched Bruce Cohen Productions, adding live events, theater, and new media to his existing film and television businesses.
Most recently, Cohen produced the Academy Award-nominated film Silver Linings Playbook. The film was nominated for eight Academy Awards and was the first film to be Oscar-nominated for the four acting categories since 1981. The blockbuster grossed over $236 million worldwide, more than eleven times its budget.
Along with producing partner Dan Jinks, Bruce produced Milk, starring Sean Penn as “Harvey Milk.” The film was nominated for 8 Academy Awards, including Best Picture. It was also nominated for Best Picture by the British Academy Awards (BAFTAs) and the Producer’s Guild (PGA), and received the PGA’s Stanley Kramer Award.
Bruce and Dan won the Best Picture Academy Award in 2000 for producing American Beauty. The film, which won a total of five Oscars, as well as the Golden Globe, BAFTA, and PGA Award, was the first film produced through The Jinks/Cohen Company. Their second film was Down with Love starring Renee Zellweger and Ewan McGregor, followed by Big Fish, which was nominated as Best Picture by both the Golden Globes and the BAFTAs. Other films include The Forgotten, starring Julianne Moore, and The Nines, starring Ryan Reynolds and Hope Davis.
In television, the pair executive produced the acclaimed ABC series Pushing Daisies, which won a total of 7 Emmys and was nominated for a Golden Globe as best comedy.
Before his partnership with Dan, Bruce produced The Flintstones and the prequel, The Flintstones: In Viva Rock Vegas, as well as Mousehunt. He executive produced To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar! and co-produced Alive. A graduate of Yale University with a Bachelor of Arts in 1983, he began his film career as the DGA trainee on Steven Spielberg’s The Color Purple and went on to serve as the associate producer and first assistant director on Spielberg’s Hook.
Along with James Moll and Dan Jinks, Bruce produced A Timeless Call, a film tribute to veterans, directed by Spielberg for the 2008 Democratic Convention in Denver. He was appointed by Mayor Villaraigosa of Los Angeles to the Mayoral Transition Team in 2005, and Bruce and his husband, Gabe Catone, were the first LGBT couple to be married by the Mayor at City Hall in May, 2008. He is on the Board of Directors of the American Foundation for Equal Rights, the group behind the federal case to have Prop 8 declared unconstitutional and on the Advisory Board of the Harvey Milk Foundation.
Bruce recently finished up his second term as Vice President of Motion Pictures of the Producer’s Guild. He is on the Executive Committee of the Producer’s Branch of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and produced the first ever Governor’s Awards for the Academy in November 2009.
Silver Linings Playbook Producer 2012
8 (Video) Executive Producer 2012
The 83rd Annual Academy Awards Producer 2011
Pushing Daisies (TV Series) Executive Producer 2007 – 2009
A Timeless Call (Documentary short) Producer 2008
Traveler (TV Series) Executive Producer 2007
The Nines Producer 2007
Hate (TV Movie) Executive Producer 2005
The Forgotten Producer 2004
Big Fish Producer 2003
Down with Love Producer 2003
The Flintstones in Viva Rock Vegas Producer 2000
American Beauty Producer 1999
Mouse hunt Producer 1997
Mistrial (TV Movie) Producer 1996
To Wong Foo Thanks for Everything,
The Flintstones Producer 1994
Alive: 20 Years Later (Video documentary) Executive Producer 1993
Alive Co-Producer 1993
Hook Associate Producer/1st AD 1991
Nicholas Hoult to Play Author J.D. Salinger in ‘Rebel in the Rye’ | Variety | August 30, 2015
The script was adapted from the Kenneth Slawenski biography “J.D. Salinger: A Life.” Black Label Media is financing, with Molly Smith, Trent Luckinbill and Thad Luckinbill producing alongside Bruce Cohen, Jason Shuman and Danny Strong.
Bloom will introduce “Rebel in the Rye” to foreign buyers at the upcoming Toronto Film Festival, while CAA is representing the North American rights.
The movie will explore the life and mind of the secretive author and tell the story of the birth of “The Catcher in the Rye.” The story will explore his rebellious youth, his experiences on the bloody front lines of World War II, enduring great love and terrible loss, a life of rejection to the pages of the New Yorker and his writer’s block — which led to a spiritual awakening.
“’The Catcher in the Rye’ is a classic coming-of-age story which continues to make a significant impression six generations later,” said Alex Walton of Bloom. “The world has long been fascinated with J.D. Salinger, whom the talented Nicholas Hoult will bring to life in this enigmatic role.”
Strong is known best for creating the series “Empire.” His screenplay credits include “The Butler,” the two “The Hunger Games: Mockingjay” films and the HBO films “Recount” and “Game Change.”
Hoult’s credits include “Mad Max: Fury Road” and “X-Men: Days of Future Passed.”
He also stars in the upcoming sci-fi romance “Equals” alongside Kristen Stewart, Guy Pearce and Jacki Weaver. The film, directed by Drake Doremus, will world premiere in the international competition section at the Venice Film Festival and will have its North American premiere in the Special Presentations program at the Toronto Film Festival.
The Weinstein Company announced in 2013 that it was working with Shane Salerno on developing a feature film adaptation of Salerno’s documentary about the author with a focus on Salinger’s life between his military service in World War II and the 1951 publication of “Catcher in the Rye.”
Salerno began working on the documentary in 2004. Salinger died in 2010. The documentary grossed $650,000 for TWC in 2013.
Hoult is represented by UTA, 42 and Felker Toczek.
ABC Orders Gay Rights Movement Miniseries From Milk Producers | TVLine | December 21, 2015
The team behind the Oscar-winning film Milk is staying in familiar waters for its next project.
ABC has greenlit When We Rise, an eight-hour miniseries about the gay rights movement.
The project, which was in development for more than two years at ABC, chronicles the personal and political struggles of a diverse family of LGBT men and women, who helped pioneer the gay rights movement from its turbulent infancy to its modern successes.
Milk director Gus Van Sant will helm the mini’s first two hours. Dustin Lance Black, the film’s writer, will pen the script and executive-produce with Van Sant and Bruce Cohen (another of the movie’s producers).
Released in 2008, Milk starred Sean Penn as gay rights activist Harvey Milk and won two Oscars for Best Actor and Best Original Screenplay.
Producers Dan Jinks & Bruce Cohen Split Up | Deadline | Feb 16, 2010
The duo will continue to work together under their Warner Bros.-based television company, and say they intend to see through several feature projects that include the Catherine Hardwicke-directed Hamlet with Emile Hirsch attached to the Ron Nyswaner script, My Name is Jody Williams, with Audrey Wells directing her script, and the Robin Swicord-scripted The Rivals, a period drama that once had Steven Spielberg attached to direct.
Besides the 5-time Oscarwinner American Beauty, Jinks and Cohen produced the Gus Van Sant-directed Milk, the Tim Burton-directed Big Fish, the mystery thriller The Forgotten, the John August-directed The Nines, and the misfire Down With Love. Their Jinks/ Cohen banner was long located at DreamWorks, then moved to Paramount. That deal ended during the WGA strike and since then they have been Warner Bros-based for their TV output including Pushing Daisies, which won 8 Emmys before ABC canceled it, Traveler, another series for ABC, and Side Order Of Life for Lifetime.