Paul Aaron has been creating successful productions since he began his
professional career directing a national company of "The Prime Of Miss
Jean Brodie", starring Oscar-winning actress
Kim Hunter. He made an impressive
switch to films with the sensitive and critically acclaimed
Beziehungsweise andersrum (1978),
starring Meg Foster and
Perry King. This film, which now appears
regularly in film revival houses and on cable television, has become a
"cult classic".
Following graduation from Bennington College, Paul Aaron arrived in Los
Angeles to become the Casting and New Programs Director for the
Mark Taper Forum. At the same time, he
founded an actor's workshop and directed several plays, including a
critically acclaimed production of "The Three Penny Opera". He was
brought to New York to direct the successful, off-Broadway rock musical
hit, "Salvation", featuring, among others, the then- unknowns
Bette Midler,
Barry Bostwick and
Joe Morton. He next moved to Broadway
to direct the comedy "Paris Is Out", starring
Sam Levene and
Molly Picon, becoming the youngest director
in Broadway history.
After directing the first international company of "Salvation" in
Amsterdam, he returned to New York to helm, among other plays, the Obie
award-winning off-Broadway musical, "Love My Children", and, on
Broadway, the John Kander and
Fred Ebb musical, "70 Girls 70", the
Howard Dietz and
Arthur Schwartz musical, "That's
Entertainment", and the American premier of Italian playwright
Ugo Betti's drama, "The Burnt Flowerbed".
Variety called his direction of that play "...nothing less than
masterful".
Soon after moving back to the West Coast, Aaron directed an immensely
successful revival of Paddy Chayefsky's,
"The Tenth Man", starring
Richard Dreyfuss. He was awarded the
Los Angeles Drama Critic's Award as best director of the year for this
presentation.
His second feature film as a director,
Der Bulldozer (1979), an
action-thriller staring Chuck Norris and
Jennifer O'Neill, with a
screenplay by Academy Award-winner
Ernest Tidyman, was a tremendous box
office success.
Paul's next challenge was to direct
William Gibson's classic,
The Miracle Worker (1979),
starring Patty Duke and
Melissa Gilbert. This NBC
Special Event not only garnered some of the network's highest ratings
for the season, but also won Paul a number of distinguished awards,
both here and abroad. These include a Director's Guild nomination, the
Director's prize from the Monte Carlo Film Festival, a Golden Globe
nomination and the Christopher Award. "The Miracle Worker" was
nominated for four Emmys and won three, including one for
Patty Duke as "Lead Actress in a Dramatic
Special" and, even more impressive, the Emmy as "Outstanding Dramatic
Special" of the 1979-1980 season.
For his next project, he chose to direct the CBS movie,
Thin Ice (1981), starring
Kate Jackson and the venerable film
star, Lillian Gish.
He followed "Thin Ice" with a return to Broadway, directing
Claudette Colbert in "A Talent For
Murder", an original suspense-comedy that turned out to be her last
work on the stage.
Next on film was the CBS Special,
Maid in America (1982),
starring Mildred Natwick,
Susan Clark and
Fritz Weaver. Aaron then directed the ABC
film,
When She Says No (1984),
which starred Kathleen Quinlan,
Jane Alexander and
Rip Torn.
Aaron's company, "Elsboy Entertainment", purchased and developed the
Jack Finney novel, "Marion's Wall",
and Aaron adapted it for the screen with
Patricia Resnick, who wrote the
screenplay. The movie, entitled
Maxie (1985), starring
Glenn Close and
Mandy Patinkin and directed by Aaron, was
produced in association with "Elsboy Entertainment" and was released by
Orion Pictures.
He then directed the award-winning NBC television special,
Gefangene des Krieges (1987),
the story of Adm. Jim Stockdale, which
starred James Woods and
Jane Alexander. "In Love and War"
garnered brilliant reviews and was chosen by The Hollywood Reporter as
one of the top five shows televised during the season.
Aaron had also been concentrating on building a successful management
and production company under the umbrella of "Elsboy Entertainment". In
1992, he sold the management division of his company to
Erwin Stoff, who had worked with him for
fifteen years. They met when Paul was a guest professor at the
University of Washington in Seattle where Erwin was a grad student.
Together, they developed the careers of several now-famous actors,
writers and directors.
The reason Paul decided to leave the rigors of running a full-time
management company was to concentrate on his writing and producing. The
first project he sold was a three-hour mini-series for HBO, entitled
Laurel Avenue (1993),
which he executive-produced, co-created and wrote with
Michael Henry Brown. It aired in
1993 and was called "a golden moment in the history of television", by
Pulitzer prize-winning critic Tom Shales of
the Washington Post.
Paul returned to directing with a film, for the Lifetime Cable Network,
entitled,
Untamed Love (1994). It is
based on the book, "One Child", by
Torey Hayden, and recounts the
extraordinary true story of her work with special education students in
the public schools.
Aaron's next project was a one-hour dramatic series for CBS entitled,
Under One Roof (1995), which
he executive-produced with
Michael Henry Brown and
Thomas Carter, and which he
co-created and co-wrote. It starred
James Earl Jones and
Joe Morton.
The summer of 1996 saw the premiere of
Grand Avenue (1996), a
three-hour dramatic mini-series based on the book of the same title by
Greg Sarris. Aaron and "Elsboy
Entertainment" executive-produced the project with
Robert Redford and his company,
Wildwood Enterprises, Inc. This saga of three Native American families
in Santa Rosa, California, was the first major exploration of
contemporary Indian life on American television. It won critical
acclaim among both the Native American and mainstream audiences, and
scored the highest rating of any HBO program of the season. Paul is
continuing to develop "Calle Ocho" (Eighth Street), the next
installment in his
'American family' series for HBO, which focuses on an extended
Cuban-American family in Miami.
In addition, Paul recently did a rewrite for "Jerry Bruckheimer Films" and another for 'Robert DeNiro''s
"Tribeca Films" with his former writing partner,
Michael Henry Brown. They also wrote
"Land of Opportunity" (2000), adapted from the book by
William Adler, and "Shadowman"
(2000), based on the popular comic book, both for New Line Pictures.
Their original screenplay
Undercover - In too Deep (1999) was made into a
major motion picture by Miramax Films which Paul also produced.
Roger Ebert, among many other critics, gave
the film two very "big thumbs up".
In 2005, Paul produced his most recent feature,
Looking for Sunday (2006),
starring Michael Weston,
Orlando Jones and
Katharine Towne, independently, with the
hopes for release in 2006.
Currently, Paul is producing the independent film which Suntaur
developed,
Skills Like This (2007).
