Jerry Bruckheimer

One of the most powerful producers in Hollywood, Jerry Bruckheimer has been making blockbuster films since the 1980s, branching out into television in the 1990s with his golden touch. He has achieved great success in the genres of action, drama, and science fiction. His best known television series are CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, CSI: Miami, CSI: NY, Without a Trace, Cold Case, The Amazing Race, and Dark Blue. His best known movies include Beverly Hills Cop, Top Gun, The Rock, Con Air, Coyote Ugly, Crimson Tide, Armageddon, Enemy of the State, Gone in 60 Seconds, Black Hawk Down, Pearl Harbor, Pirates of the Caribbean, G-Force, King Arthur, Prince of Persia and the National Treasure franchise.

He was born Jerome Leon Bruckheimer on September 21, 1945 in Detroit, Michigan, the only child of German Jewish immigrants. Bruckheimer attended Mumford High School in Detroit until moving to Arizona for college at age 17. He graduated with a degree in psychology and a minor in algebra from the University of Arizona where he was a member of the Zeta Beta Tau Fraternity. A film buff at an early age with an interest in photography, Bruckheimer would take snapshots when he had the opportunity. After college Bruckheimer worked in advertising in Detroit and New York City, producing award-winning commercials.

Bruckheimer moved to Los Angeles, CA in the early 1970s to make his mark as a producer, starting with an associate producer gig on the revisionist western "The Culpepper Cattle Company" (1972). Working with director Dick Richards, Bruckheimer produced two more films which were not particular successes, Farewell My Lovely in 1975 and 1977's March or Die. In the early 1980s, the producer received more acclaim for the films he produced with director Paul Schrader, American Gigolo and Cat People. Bruckheimer also received attention for his work with director Michael Mann's Thief. By this time, the distinct look of a Bruckheimer film was already developing.

In 1983, Bruckheimer formed Simpson-Bruckheimer Productions with Don Simpson as his producing partner. Bruckheimer had known Simpson since the early 1970s. They had met through friends in the film industry, and lived together briefly in 1974 when Bruckheimer and his first wife, Bonnie, were separated. Simpson and Bruckheimer began their professional affiliation in the early 1980s at Paramount. At the time, Simpson was given a production deal as part of a severance package when he was fired as president of Paramount. Simpson had drug and alcohol problems which were being displayed much too publicly for the company's tastes. Bruckheimer and Simpson complemented each others' professional needs. Bruckheimer needed someone to give him the creative credibility he lacked as a minor player in Hollywood.

Together, they produced a string of hits which brought them to prominence as producers. Their first box-office smash came in 1983 with Flashdance, which cost only $10 million to make but grossed more than $200 million worldwide. Flashdance was followed by Beverly Hills Cop in 1984 and Top Gun in 1986, both major hits. Such films helped define how movies were made in Hollywood in the 1980s. These films reflected trends in American society with popular soundtracks. Bruckheimer and Simpson also changed the role of the producer in films, taking more control over every aspect of each film.

By the mid-1980s, Simpson's continued substance and medication abuse problems meant that he spent little time on the sets of their films. Bruckheimer had to do damage control for his partner. Many in Hollywood believed that Bruckheimer focused primarily on the bottom line and the actual productions, including editing, cinematography, and special effects. He was seen as the calm, funny, voice of reason in the pair. Over time, it came to be seen that Bruckheimer played a huge role in the creative process which had been overshadowed by Simpson's manic work energy, high-concept film stories, and reputation. Bruckheimer told the Daily Telegraph’s Sheldon, "Don's ego made him think that he was the creative guy, and he was. But it was never the case that I was just the numbers guy. I knew it was a real partnership, and that I had contributed to all aspects of it."

By the 1990s, Bruckheimer essentially ran the whole company, though Simpson's name and input were included in the films. The pair's films in the late 1980s and early 1990s often did not do as well at the box office, including 1990's Days of Thunder and 1994's The Ref. Bruckheimer and Simpson did have several hits in the mid-1990s, including Bad Boys, Dangerous Minds, and The Rock. During the production of The Rock, Simpson died of heart failure related to his substance abuse problem. He was only 52 years old.

Though he was personally torn up by his long-time friend's death, Bruckheimer continued to produce films alone. He had already legally dissolved the partnership six months before, though The Rock was released under the Simpson-Bruckheimer name. Bruckheimer then formed Jerry Bruckheimer Films, and released his first film as a solo entity in 1997, Con Air. With his new company, he tried to make two to three films per year. Bruckheimer produced a number of hit films in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

One of Bruckheimer's first big hits with his new company was 1998's Armageddon. Despite his strong reputation, he sometimes had to fight to get the money to make films, like 2001's Black Hawk Down. This was a modern war movie about a U.S. military snafu in Somalia. Bruckheimer easily sold the concept behind the World War II epic Pearl Harbor, released the same year. Pearl Harbor was a hit at the box office; one of the biggest of the year with a box office of $450 million, through critics panned the film.

In 2001, what would become a hit movie franchise landed in Bruckheimer's lap. Dick Cook, the chairman of Walt Disney Studios, told Ben Fritz of Variety, "Jerry could take what we thought was a good idea and turn it into a great idea. Because of our ambition for this movie, because we knew it would be a complicated production, there were so many elements there that we didn't think we knew anyone who could do the project except Jerry." Bruckheimer produced the film, which was called Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl; the movie was based on a ride at the Disney theme parks. Released in 2003 and starring Johnny Depp, Orlando Bloom, and Keira Knightley, the film grossed more than $650 million worldwide. The cast was retained for the sequels, including the 2006 summer blockbuster Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest , which received worse reviews than the original but was still a success at the box office.

While Bruckheimer's status as a film producer was becoming legendary, he also was making inroads into another part of Hollywood: television. In the late 1990s, he began working in television under the banner Jerry Bruckheimer Television. His goal was to use production values similar to film on prime-time television programming and make each episode like a movie. Bruckheimer told Michael Schneider of Variety, "We approach TV as a serious business; it's not just a sideline for us. We're passionate about it; we put enormous energy in it."

The first television series that Bruckheimer executive produced, Soldier of Fortune, Inc., was a syndicated show which failed. It took several years for Bruckheimer and his company to be successful at television, but by the early 2000s, he was a dominant force in television as well. In 2001, Bruckheimer had his first big hit with C.S.I.: Crime Scene Investigation, which aired on CBS and was an unexpected smash hit. C.S.I.: Crime Scene Investigation later spawned spin-offs, CSI: Miami and CSI: NY. He produced another hit for CBS with the FBI missing persons drama Without a Trace which began airing in 2002. Dramas were not the only shows produced by Bruckheimer. In 2001, he also had a hit reality show called The Amazing Race which aired on CBS for several seasons.

By 2005, Bruckheimer's company had ten series on the fall television schedule for several networks. This was a record for a company in Hollywood, beating the previous mark of eight set by television icon Aaron Spelling. Six of Bruckheimer's 2005 shows were returning, while four were new shows. Two of Bruckheimer's new shows that season ultimately failed: NBC's E-Ring, a drama set at the Pentagon, and Just Legal, a legal show starring Don Johnson, on the WB. He had had other failures as well, including his 2003 soap opera-like show for FOX on the porn industry, Skin. Bruckheimer created his first comedy, Modern Men, on the WB in 2006, but was not picked up when the network merged with UPN to form the CW later that year.

The networks appreciated Bruckheimer's generous attitude towards television, which including ideas for marketing. Les Moonves, head of CBS, told Stuart Levine of Variety, "What he brought to CSI was its unmistakable style; its look and feel were groundbreaking. He's also brought ideas for advertising and promotion, offering a different point of view for television that's helped a great deal."

Despite his power and stature in Hollywood, Bruckheimer lives inconspicuously and keeps a low pro-file in Hollywood. He does not promote himself, nor has he appeared in any of his productions. Bruckheimer enjoys playing ice hockey in his spare time, as he has since childhood. He told David S. Cohen of Variety, "It's not about who you're having dinner with or the parties that you're going to. It's about the work that you do. That's the important thing for me."

Sources: Yahoo, Wikipedia, Notable Biographies