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More Edward Zwick Bios & Profiles

 

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Biography #2 (for The Last Samurai)

Edward Zwick began directing and acting in high school and trained as an apprentice at the Academy Festival in Lake Forest, Illinois. While studying literature at Harvard, he continued writing and directing for the theatre. Upon graduation, he was awarded a Rockefeller Fellowship to study in Europe with some of the major innovative theatre companies.

Zwick was accepted as a Directing Fellow at the American Film Institute in 1975. Timothy and the Angel, Zwick's AFI short film, won first place in the student film competition at the 1976 Chicago Film Festival and caught the attention of the producers of the television series, Family. He served as story editor on Family and subsequently became a director and producer.

For his work on the television movie Special Bulletin (as director, producer and co-writer), Zwick received two Emmy Awards. This also marked the beginning of his collaboration with Marshall Herskovitz, with whom he then created the Emmy Award-winning television series thirtysomething. Together Herskovitz and Zwick created The Bedford Falls Company as their home for film and television projects, including the critically acclaimed television series My So-Called Life, Relativity and the Emmy Award and Golden Globe Award-winning series Once and Again.

Zwick began his feature film career directing About Last Night. He went on to direct the Academy Award-winning films Glory and Legends of the Fall, as well as Leaving Normal and Courage Under Fire. Zwick's most recent film was The Siege, starring Denzel Washington and Annette Bening. Zwick and Herskovitz produced Traffic, winner of two Golden Globes and four Academy Awards, directed by Steven Soderbergh. Under the Bedford Falls banner, they also produced I Am Sam.

Zwick has been honored with three Emmy Awards, the Humanitas Prize, the Writers Guild of America Award, two Peabody Awards, a Directors Guild of America Award, and the Franklin J. Schaffner Alumni Award from the American Film Institute. He received his first Academy Award as a producer for 1999's Best Picture Shakespeare in Love.

Bio courtesy Warner Bros. for "The Last Samurai" (02-Dec-2003)