BRUCE BERESFORD
DIRECTOR
Director Bruce Beresford brings to life the romance and excitement of turn-of-the-century Vienna in BRIDE OF THE WIND, the true story of one of the 20th century's most remarkable women, Alma Mahler, lover to Europe's greatest geniuses.
Beresford is well known to movie-lovers for his direction of the moving drama Driving Miss Daisy, which won the Best Picture, Best Actress and Best Screenplay Oscars in 1989. But Beresford has also directed such diverse features as the recent Ashley Judd thriller Double Jeopardy; the Oscar-winning country music drama Tender Mercies; the comedy Crimes From the Heart with Diane Keaton, Sissy Spacek and Jessica Lange; the colonial African adventure Mister Johnson; the period action-adventure Black Robe about early clashes with Native Americans and the Japanese POW camp story, Paradise Road.
Beresford began his career as part of Australia's "New Wave " of filmmaking with such films as Don's Party, The Getting of Wisdom and the internationally acclaimed Breaker Morant. He will next direct Boswell for the Defense, starring Michael Caine, Michael Gambon and Samantha Morton.
In addition to his work on feature films, Beresford has directed a number of operas, including "Rigoletto" for the Los Angeles Opera and the world premiere of Carlisle Floyd's "Cold Sassy Tree" for the Houston Grand Opera, both in 2000.
LAWRENCE LEVY
PRODUCER
Originally a graphic designer, Lawrence Levy began his film career producing and directing documentaries, including Ten Thousand Beads for Navajo Sam for CBS, Kibbutz at the Crossroads for PBS, and Brown vs. the Board of Education for the Discovery Channel. Funeral, a documentary short, won awards at major film festivals including Chicago and San Francisco.
On network television he directed segments of a number of dramatic shows including Hill Street Blues, The White Shadow, Whiz Kids, True Confessions and Lottery. Levy produced and directed The Wrong Way Kid, an Emmy award-winning movie with Dick Van Dyke, which combined both animated and live-action sequences.
In 1999 he produced Desert Heat, together with Evzan Kolar, a feature film starring Jean-Claude van Damme and Pat Morita and directed by John Avildsen. The same year Levy produced Mr. Rock 'N Roll, an MOW at NBC about Alan Freed and the early days of rock 'n roll.
He has several projects currently in development including Sabrin, at the Samuel Goldwyn Company (set during the same time period as Bride of the Wind and by the same writer), the story of a love affair between Carl Jung and an early patient of his. Other projects in development include The Atlanta Eight at HBO, Blue Moon by Sara Prejean, and The Inventors of Sex.
Levy was president of Edgewood Films (a public company), and is presently in the process of setting up a new company, Catapult Digital Films, Inc.
EVZEN KOLAR
PRODUCER
Evzen Kolar's early credits include the Oscar-nominated Street Smart starring Morgan Freeman, Bat 21 with Gene Hackman and Danny Glover, Double Impact with Jean-Claude Van Damme and Storyville with James Spader and Jason Robards. In 1992, he set up his own production company, KPI, and since then has produced the youth comedy Surf Ninjas, the Zalman King erotic drama Delta of Venus and the critically acclaimed City of Industry starring Harvey Keitel and Stephen Dorff.
Most recently, KPI produced the action film Desert Heat, starring Jean-Claude Van Damme and directed by Jon Avildsen. Currently in development are The Reconstruction to be directed by David Anspaugh (Hoosiers); When Nietzsche Wept, from the best-selling novel by Irvin D. Yalom and the cable feature "Tip on a Dead Crab. "
Kolar began his film and television career as a child actor, and later as an assistant director, in his native Czech Republic. He worked throughout Europe in television, features and theatre, before coming to the U. S. in the 1980s.
GERALD GREEN
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER
Executive Producer Gerald Green has been a producer in the motion picture industry for over 20 years, involved in the financing, production, and/or co-production of over twenty international films, amongst them Oliver Stone's Salvador and Platoon, as well as Dune, Rambo II, Conan II, and The Falcon and The Snowman.
During his career, Green has established a strong reputation as a producer of high quality films and has become recognized and acknowledged as an expert in location filming, particularly in Europe and Mexico.
In 1997, Green formed Total Film Group, a public entertainment company primarily involved in the financing, production, and distribution of feature motion pictures. The company also has activities in the fields of traditional and digital advertising/marketing, web site/e-commerce design and development, and graphic arts.
FRANK HUBNER
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER
Hubner serves as executive producer on Bride of the Wind. His most recent project Diggity starring Andrew McCarthy will soon be released.
Hubner most recently co-produced My First Mister, directed by Christine Lahti starring Albert Brooks and Leelee Sobieski will also be released later this year by Paramount Classics.
STEPHEN ENDELMAN
COMPOSER
Composer Stephen Endelman has shown remarkable ability to draw inspiration from a variety of musical traditions. His works have ranged from the rich orchestral score for The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill, but Came Down a Mountain, to his minimalist, modern score for the hit comedy Flirting With Disaster, which employs, among other things, a trio of singing saws and a battery of percussion instruments created for the film.
Endelman received critical acclaim for his symphonic score entitled "Passport To The Universe," a public commission for the Space Show in the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. He is currently scoring music for the museum's new "Big Bang show. " On June 5, 2001 the soundtrack will be released by Deutsche Grammophon with music by Gustav and Alma Mahler and featuring soprano RenČe Fleming. Endelman is currently working on Beresford's new film, Boswell for the Defense, in addition to producing Ute Lemper's new album.
English-born Endelman began playing the clarinet at age seven and became a full time scholar at The Purcell School of Young Musicians at age twelve. He then studied composition at London's Guildhall School of Music Drama and the Banff School of Fine Arts in Alberta, Canada. Besides his growing body of film work, Endelman has composed two operas, "L'Arrache-Coeur" and "A Safe Place," and at the age of 18 composed the music for the Broadway production of Eugene O'Neill's "A Moon For The Misbegotten. "
An ardent film-lover, Endelman moved to the United States in 1992 to pursue and develop his career in film music. His first score for a feature film was Nancy Savoca's Household Saints. He then worked closely with Robert DeNiro on his directorial debut, A Bronx Tale.
After two more independent films, Postcards From America and Imaginary Crimes, Endelman worked in the pop genre Jeffrey, Christopher Ashley's look at the effect of the AIDS crisis on one young man.
Keen on weaving unusual sounds into his scores, Endelman used a solo folk violin for Disney's dark version of Mark Twain's Tom And Huck. For that film, he wrote his own melodies while drawing on folk traditions, as he had done on The Journey Of August King.
Endelman's other films include Camillia, Christopher Monger's The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill, but Came Down a Mountain, The Journey of August King, David O' Russell's Flirting With Disaster, and Cosi. He will be working with Monger again on the film The Amateur Pornographer. Also Two Family House, which received an Audience Award for Best Dramatic Film at the Sundance Film Festival, Norman Rene's Reckless, and City of Industry, directed by John Irvin. He also scored Kicked in the Head, a Martin Scorcese production directed by Matthew Harrison, The Proposition, Finding Graceland, and Jawbreaker.
In 1996, he won the ASCAP Foundation Award as Resident Composer at the Metropolitan Opera Guild where he has been a resident artisit since 1993.
REN…E FLEMING
SOPRANO
Acclaimed by the press as "one of the truly magnificent voices of our time," American soprano Renee Fleming's international career spans over a decade. Renowned for her commanding musicianship, intelligence and interpretive abilities, the Grammy Award winning soprano has cultivated a devoted following worldwide for her work on the operatic stage, in concerts and recitals, on television, radio and recordings, and as a champion of new music.
Following performances of Mozart's Don Giovanni at the Salzburg Festival and concerts with the NDR Orchestra at the Schleswig-Holstein Festival in August, Ms. Fleming opened the MET's 2000-2001 season with performances of Don Giovanni, James Levine conducting, followed by the October 4 season opening gala of Lincoln Center's Great Performers telecast on PBS' Live From Lincoln Center from Avery Fisher Hall.
Renee Fleming's early awards include winning the 1998 Metropolitan Opera National Auditions, the Richard Tucker Award, the George London Prize, the Grand Prix at the International Singing Competition in Belgium, and a Fulbright Scholarship to Germany. She studied at The Julliard School and holds degrees from the State University of New York at Potsdam and the Eastman School of Music. In Bride of the Wind, the esteemed soprano sings an original Alma Mahler piece, reorchestrated by Stephen Endelman, and accompanied on the piano by Jean-Yves Thibaudet. Though Ms. Fleming currently resides in Connecticut with her children, she will be touring in venues around the world this summer.
HERBERT PINTER
PRODUCTION DESIGNER
Production designer Herbert Pinter recreated the lavish appointments and revolutionary new designs of turn-of-the-century Vienna for BRIDE OF THE WIND. Pinter previously collaborated with Bruce Beresford in recreating colonial Africa for Mister Johnson; the rustic wilderness of early North America in Black Robe and a Japanese POW camp for Paradise Road.
His designs have also been seen in The Year of Living Dangerously, The Fringe Dwellers, Belinda, Sniper, A Good Man in Africa and Tarzan and the Lost City.
PETER JAMES
DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY
Cinematographer Peter James reunites with Bruce Beresford, having shot his Oscar-winning Driving Miss Daisy, as well as Mister Johnson, Black Robe, Paradise Road and Double Jeopardy.
James most recently served as cinematographer on the runaway hit comedy Meet The Parents, starring Ben Stiller and Robert DeNiro. His extensive credits also include The Newton Boys, Last Dance, Diabolique, Silent Fall, Thing Called Love, Rich in Love and Alive. He most recently shot the forthcoming The Man Who Sued God with Judy Davis, Colin Friels and Billy Connelly.
SHUNA HARWOOD
COSTUME DESIGNER
Costume designer Shuna Harwood went back into history to uncover the up-to-minute fashions of turn-of-the-century Vienna for THE BRIDE OF THE WIND. Harwood most recently created designs for a whole different era of glamour, creating costumes for Julia Roberts, Hugh Grant and the rest of the cast of the comedy Notting Hill. Harwood's other credits include Simoom: A Passion in the Desert, Richard III, Double Vision, Track 29, Personal Services, Wish You Were Here, Insignificance, Brimstone and Treacle, The Missionary, Sword of the Valiant and The Haunting of Julia.
MARILYN LEVY
WRITER
Bride of the Wind is Marilyn Levy's first produced screenplay. Two of her other projects currently in development are Sabina and Run For Your Life, which is based on one of Levy's young adult novels.
A former teacher and psychotherapist, Levy is the author of 16 other award winning young adult novels.
Levy has also written for the theater and has had a play produced in New York entitled "Dangerous Perceptions. "
