Elizabethtown Crew
 Cameron Crowe
Cameron Crowe (Writer / Director/ Producer) was born on July 13, 1957 in Palm Springs, California. He was raised in San Diego by his father, James, a residential real estate agent and mother, Alice, who taught sociology and English literature at the local college. Recognizing that Crowe was gifted at a very young age, his mother pushed him to excel. He skipped kindergarten and two grades in elementary school, and, by the time he attended the University of San Diego High School, he was quite obviously younger than the other students.
Crowe began writing for the school newspaper and by age 13 was contributing music reviews for an underground publication called the San Diego Door. He then began corresponding with legendary rock & roll critic, Lester Bangs, who had left the Door to become editor at the national rock magazine Creem, and soon Crowe was also submitting articles to Creem, Penthouse, Playboy, Crawdaddy, Music World, Circus and the Los Angeles Times.
After graduating from high school in 1972 at age 15, Crowe joined the staff of Rolling Stone as a Contributing Editor and later went on to become an Associate Editor for the magazine. During that time, he profiled such influential music-world figures as Bob Dylan, David Bowie, Neil Young, Eric Clapton and the members of Led Zeppelin.
When Rolling Stone moved its offices to New York, Crowe decided to try his hand in other artistic endeavors. Though he would continue to freelance for Rolling Stone on and off over the years, he turned the focus of his attention to a book about teens growing up in the late '70s.
In 1979, Crowe (then 22) went undercover as a southern California high schooler to research his book on teen life. Fast Times at Ridgemont High became a bestseller and Universal Pictures tapped Crowe to write the screenplay. Released in the spring of `82 and directed by Amy Heckerling, “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” became one of the year's biggest hits and launched the careers of such stars as Sean Penn, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Judge Reinhold, Forest Whitaker, Nicolas Cage and Eric Stoltz. The Writers Guild of America awarded Crowe with a nomination for Best Screen Adaptation, and the film became an instant cult classic.
In 1989, Crowe made his feature film directorial debut with his original screenplay “Say Anything...” starring John Cusack and Ione Skye. Cameron's second movie, set in Seattle, was the 1992 romantic comedy “Singles.”
Crowe's next project, “Jerry Maguire” starring Tom Cruise, Renee Zellweger and Cuba Gooding Jr., was released in 1996 to enormous box office success and critical acclaim. The film was nominated for five Academy Awards including Best Original Screenplay and Best Picture, and Cuba Gooding Jr. took home the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor. Cameron also received a nomination from the Directors Guild of America for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Feature Film.
Conversations with Wilder, a collection of interviews with legendary director Billy Wilder, was published in November of 1999 by Knopf.
“Almost Famous,” released in September 2000, was the culmination of a ten-year journey to put Cameron's experiences working for Rolling Stone on film. It was cited on over 150 critic's Top 10 List's for 2000 and received six Golden Globe and four Academy Award nominations. The film received two Golden Globes for Best Motion Picture - Comedy/Musical and Best Supporting Actress (Kate Hudson), and Cameron received his first Oscar for Best Original Screenplay.
Cameron's next film, “Vanilla Sky,” a retelling of the Spanish film “Abre los Ojos” (Open Your Eyes), starred Tom Cruise, Penelope Cruz and Cameron Diaz. “Vanilla Sky” was a worldwide box office success, with Cameron Diaz receiving wide critical acclaim. Paul McCartney's title song was also nominated for an Academy Award.
 Tom Cruise
Tom Cruise (producer) has blazed a meteoric trail of success as an actor, producer, and humanitarian in an unparalleled career that spans two decades. A three-time Academy Award nominee, the combined force of his work on film as both an actor and producer has earned more than six billion dollars at the box office worldwide.
Cruise's most recent film, the international blockbuster “War of the Worlds,” set new career highs for largest opening day, largest opening weekend, largest single day, and largest total worldwide gross. “War of the Worlds” marked Cruise's second collaboration with director Steven Spielberg; in 2002, Cruise starred in Spielberg's futuristic thriller, “Minority Report.”
Under the banner of Cruise|Wagner productions - which Cruise formed in 1993 with his partner, Paula Wagner - Cruise is currently filming the third installment of the blockbuster “Mission: Impossible” franchise, which has grossed over one billion dollars worldwide to date.
Cruise made his feature film debut in 1981 at the age of 19 in the romantic drama “Endless Love,” followed by the critically acclaimed “Taps,” co-starring Sean Penn and Timothy Hutton, and Francis Ford Coppola's “The Outsiders.” His breakout performance in “Risky Business” earned him his first Golden Globe nomination in 1983. The role of Maverick in Tony Scott's “Top Gun” catapulted Cruise to international stardom as the film went on to become the highest grossing picture of 1986.
Cruise followed up on the tremendous success of “Top Gun” with a string of both critically acclaimed and commercially successful films, including “The Color of Money” (1986), co-starring Paul Newman; “Rain Man” (1988), co-starring Dustin Hoffman; and director Oliver Stone's “Born of the Fourth of July” (1989), for which Cruise received an Academy Award® nomination and his first Golden Globe for Best Actor. In 1992, Cruise starred with Jack Nicholson in “A Few Good Men,” for which he received his third Golden Globe nomination. He starred in the legal thriller “The Firm” in 1993 and in “Interview with the Vampire” in 1994.
In 1996 Cruise starred in and produced the blockbuster “Mission: Impossible” which was followed the same year by Cameron Crowe's highly acclaimed “Jerry Maguire,” for which Cruise earned a second Academy Award® nomination and a second Golden Globe for Best Actor. In 1999, Cruise earned a third Academy Award® nomination and won his third Golden Globe, for Best Supporting Actor, for his powerful performance in Paul Thomas Anderson's ensemble drama, “Magnolia.” That same year, he starred in Stanley Kubrick's final film, the psychological thriller “Eyes Wide Shut,” bringing a range of diverse projects from both new and established talent to the screen.
In 1997, C|W received the Nova Award for Most Promising Producers in Theatrical Motion Pictures. Since that time Cruise|Wagner Productions has gone on to release a host of critically acclaimed films, including “Without Limits,” “Mission: Impossible 2”, “Shattered Glass,” “Narc” and “The Others.” In 2003, Cruise and Wagner, along with Edward Zwick and Marshall Herskovitz, produced “The Last Samurai,” which grossed over half a billion dollars worldwide. Cruise's performance in the film earned him a sixth Golden Globe nomination. “The Last Samurai” received a Producers Guild of America nomination for Best Picture and was named one of the top 10 films of the year by both the National Board of Review and the American Film Institute.
Cruise has been the recipient of countless awards and tributes, reflecting both critical and commercial recognition within the industry, and the broad popular support of audiences worldwide. This November, Cruise will receive the Stanley Kubrick Britannia Award for excellence in film from the British Academy of Film & Television Arts. He was recently honored with the MTV Generation Award, which celebrated Cruise as the actor of his generation. And, in April 2005, Cruise received a David di Donatello award for lifetime achievement.
He has been honored twice by the People's Choice Awards and received two Screen Actors Guild nominations for his work in “Jerry Maguire” and “Magnolia.” He was recognized by the Chicago Film Festival as the Actor of the Decade in 1993 and earned the NATO/SHOWEST Meritorious Achievement Award that same year. Cruise has also been honored with two Chicago Film Critics Awards, for “Born on the Fourth of July” and “Magnolia”; a Saturn Award for “Vanilla Sky”; a Blockbuster Award for “Magnolia”; and MTV Awards for “Jerry Maguire” and “Mission: Impossible II.”
Other tributes Cruise has received include Harvard's Hasty Pudding Man of the Year Award, the John Huston Award from the Artists Rights Foundation, the American Cinema Award for Distinguished Achievement in Film, and the American Cinematheque Award.
 Paula Wagner
Paula Wagner (producer) and Tom Cruise partnered to form C|W Productions in 1993, and have been based at Paramount Pictures for the past 12 years. The company has released eight diverse, groundbreaking films -- earning multiple awards, widespread critical praise and international box office success.
Together Cruise and Wagner have produced films that range in scope from the action blockbusters “Mission: Impossible” and “M:I 2” to Cameron Crowe's “Vanilla Sky” and Alejandro Amenabar's chilling supernatural thriller “The Others,” as well as Robert Towne's critically acclaimed portrait of the late runner Steve Prefontaine, “Without Limits,” and forthcoming adaptation of John Fante's novel “Ask the Dust,” starring Colin Farrell and Salma Hayek.
Wagner most recently served as executive producer of “War of the Worlds,” an Amblin Entertainment/Cruise|Wagner production starring Tom Cruise and directed by Steven Spielberg. Wagner and Cruise were also producers on Ed Zwick's “The Last Samurai,” starring Cruise, and Billy Ray's directorial debut “Shattered Glass,” starring Hayden Christensen and Peter Sarsgaard. Wagner and Cruise are currently in production on the third installment of the “Mission: Impossible” series, a franchise that has earned over a billion dollars to date.
Prior to producing, Wagner spent nearly 15 years at CAA as one of the industry's top talent agents. Before becoming an agent, Wagner was an accomplished stage actress, appearing at the Yale Repertory Theater as well as on and off-Broadway. Also a published playwright, she co-authored “Out of Our Father's House.”
In 2001, Wagner was honored by Premiere magazine with the Women in Hollywood Icon Award, and was featured the following year in Bravo's “Women on Top,” a documentary profiling top women in entertainment. She has been the recipient of the Producers Guild Nova Award, as well as their Vision Award in 2004. Additionally, Wagner is on the Board of Trustees of Carnegie Mellon University and serves on the Executive Committee of the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television. She is a member of the American Cinematheque's Board of Directors and returns this year as co-chair of the Hollywood Film Festival for the third year in a row.
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