Rob Epstein, also credited as Robert P. Epstein (born April 6, 1955, New Jersey, USA) is an non-fiction filmmaker, director, producer, writer and editor. Epstein has won two Academy Awards for Best Documentary Feature for the films The Times of Harvey Milk and Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt. He has also won four national Emmy Awards, three Peabody Awards, two DuPont Columbia Journalism award, a Guggenheim Fellowship and numerous other awards for his documentary films.

Biography

Epstein began his filmmaking career working on the 1978 film Word is Out: Stories of Some of Our Lives, a documentary about the lives of gay and lesbian Americans. Epstein answered an ad that read: "We are looking for a non-sexist man to work on a documentary film on gay life. No experience necessary, just insane dedication and a cooperative spirit."

In 1984, Epstein won the Academy Award for Documentary Feature at age 29 for The Times of Harvey Milk which he conceived and directed. After its theatrical release in 1985, The Times of Harvey Milk won numerous major awards including the Academy Award, the New York Film Critics Circle Award, the Peabody Award, and three Emmys for Epstein (as director/producer, co-editor, and interviewer), and went on to receive worldwide acclaim and distribution, showing at major film festivals, theaters, and on television on almost every continent. This film was selected by the UCLA Film and Television Archives and the Sundance Institute as a preservation project and a 35mm digitially re-mastered version of the film was released in June 2000.

In 1987, Epstein teamed up with filmmaker Jeffrey Friedman to form Telling Pictures in San Francisco, California. Their first film together was Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt, inspired by the NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt on the Mall in Washington DC. Narrated by Dustin Hoffman, Common Threads tells the dramatic story of the first decade of AIDS in America through stories of five individuals featured in the Quilt. Epstein won his second Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature for Common Threads, which also won the Peabody Award and an Emmy for Bobby McFerrin’s original all-vocal score.

Their next film, The Celluloid Closet, based on the book by film historian Vito Russo, depicts a 100-year history of homosexual characters in Hollywood movies. Narrated by Lily Tomlin, The Celluloid Closet had its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival, was featured at the Toronto, New York, and Sundance Film Festivals (at which it won the Freedom of Expression Award from the jury), and numerous international festivals, including Berlin, Tokyo, and Sydney. In addition to winning the Peabody Award and Columbia DuPont Journalism Award, Epstein and Friedman won Emmys for directing.

In 2000, Epstein and Friedman directed and produced Paragraph 175, a film that explores a hidden chapter in history: the experiences of homosexuals during the Nazi regime in Europe. Narrated by Rupert Everett, and filmed in Germany, France and Spain, Paragraph 175 had its US premiere at the Sundance Film Festival in January, 2000, where it was awarded the documentary Grand Jury Prize for Directing, followed by a European premiere at the Berlin Film Festival in February, where it won the FIPRESCI (International Film Critics Association Award).

Rob Epstein is a recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, and is a member of the Directors Guild of America, and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for which he serves as a Board Governor on the Documentary Branch.

He has taught in the graduate program at Tisch School of the Arts at New York University (NYU), and is currently Chair of the Media Arts at California College of the Arts in San Francisco, California.

Filmography

• Word is Out: Stories of Some of Our Lives — Director (1978)
• The Times of Harvey Milk — Director, Producer, Editor (1984)
• The AIDS Show — Director, Producer (1986)
• Common Threads: Stories from the Quilt — Director, Producer, Writer (1989)
• Where Are We? Our Trip Through America — Director, Producer (1989)
• The Celluloid Closet — Director, Producer, Writer (1995)
• Paragraph 175 — Director, Producer (2000)
• Underground Zero (segment "Isaiah's Rap") — Director (2002)
• "Crime & Punishment" (TV Series) — Director, Producer (2002)
• An Evening with Eddie Gomez — Director (2005)
• Ten Days That Unexpectedly Changed America: Gold Rush (TV series) — Director (2006)

References

1. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088275/awards
2. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088275/releaseinfo
3. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0097099/awards
4. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0112651/awards
5. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0236576/awards

External links