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Ed Redtke
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Ed Redtke

Ed Radtke may be the only independent filmmaker to go from juvenile felon to Guggenheim Fellow. As a young, Japanese-American kid in the all-white town of Bellbrook, Ohio, Radtke constantly got into trouble. As that Asian kid, he always got caught. He graduated high school with a GPA of 1.9. By the age of eighteen, Radtke was a father and a convicted felon.

He started taking classes at the local community college in Ohio. Then switched to the local state university. A year later, he got off a bus in New York City and began at NYU film school, where he would graduate with honors in 1985. His senior film project at NYU led him back to Ohio, where it would become something much larger.

For the next six years, Radtke worked days as a carpenter, and at night writing, producing, directing and finally editing his first feature film, BOTTOM LAND. The stark, intimate story of three generations of Midwestern farmers coping with loss, the film won best first feature at the Houston Int'l Film Festival, and played at film festivals across the country.

Radtke completed the first draft of THE DREAM CATCHER in 1994, and began working to make the film a reality. In 1996, Radtke received the last of the major NEA Filmmaking Production grants, an Ohio Arts Council Fellowship, and a Guggenheim Fellowship for THE DREAM CATCHER script.


Note: This profile was written in or before 2004.

Ed Redtke Facts

OccupationDirector

Selected Filmography

Not available.