“I am thrilled that my friend and internationally acclaimed feature film director Peter Bogdanovich will be joining our faculty at UNCSA’s School of Filmmaking,” said Dean Kerner. “Peter is a brilliant visualist and director of actors as well as being a great performer himself.  He is an immensely talented screenwriter. He was a chronicler and friend of the iconic feature film directors Orson Welles, Alfred Hitchcock, John Ford as well as such great modern directors as Quentin Tarantino and Wes Anderson.

Kerner continued:  “Peter was sought after by most every major film school in the country. We are bursting with pride that he has chosen us and will concurrently be continuing his career as an actor and director. Our students have an immense amount to learn from Peter. We know that Peter will continue to write, direct and act on a national and international level while instructing and mentoring our exceedingly talented students.”

Bogdanovich said, “I chose to teach at UNCSA because it is the preeminent school of its kind in the country and because Jordan Kerner is a superb dean and a good friend.”

UNCSA Chancellor John Mauceri praised Dean Kerner for his unceasing work to make the film school a center of excellence. “The addition of Peter Bogdanovich to the film faculty – along with other recent faculty appointments Thomas Ackerman, Ron Roose, Wade Wilson and Susan Ruskin – will make a compelling case for any student who aspires to be a filmmaker,” Mauceri said. “With a newly revised curriculum and construction starting soon on a new animation, gaming and digital design facility for our Studio Village, the School of Filmmaking is on the verge of even greater things.
 
“We are so proud of our film alumni, who continue to earn accolades for themselves and bring UNCSA and North Carolina outstanding tributes as they work in the film and television industry,” Mauceri added.

Born in Kingston, N.Y., Peter Bogdanovich began his career as an actor, studying acting with Stella Adler and appearing on television and in regional theatre.  At age 20, he began directing plays Off-Broadway and programming movies at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, where he featured the work of such prominent American directors as Howard Hawks. He turned his program notes into respected literary works about the directors, which allowed him to write a series of feature articles and profiles for Esquire.

His first work as a filmmaker was as Roger Corman’s assistant on THE WILD ANGELS (1966); Corman then financed Bogdanovich’s first film as director, TARGETS (1968), starring Boris Karloff. The next year, Bogdanovich received both critical and public acclaim with THE LAST PICTURE SHOW (1971), starring then-unknowns Jeff Bridges and Cybill Shepherd. The film was a  brilliant look at small-town life in Texas in the 1950s, and garnered eight Academy Award nominations, including best director and best screenplay  (Bogdanovich with Larry McMurtry), and won Oscars for Cloris Leachman and Ben Johnson in supporting roles.
 
Bogdanovich followed up his success with the madcap romantic hit WHAT’S UP, DOC? (1972), starring Barbra Streisand and Ryan O’Neal. Next up was PAPER MOON (1973), starring O’Neal and his nine-year-old daughter, Tatum, as a couple of unlikely con artists. The film received four Academy Award nominations and earned Tatum O’Neal an Oscar, making her the youngest actor ever to win an Oscar.  
 
Bogdanovich received critical acclaim for his version of the Henry James novel DAISY MILLER (1974), for which he was named Best Director at the Brussels Film Festival. SAINT JACK (1979), starring Ben Gazzara, received the Critics’ Prize at the Venice Film Festival. In 1981, he directed Audrey Hepburn in what would be her last starring role, THEY ALL LAUGHED.  

Another major triumph was in store when he directed the critically acclaimed MASK (1985), starring Cher and Eric Stoltz in a true story about a mother and son affected by the son’s rare, disfiguring disease. Cher received the Best Actress Award at the Cannes Film Festival.  

In 1990, Bogdanovich directed the well-received sequel to THE  LAST PICTURE SHOW, TEXASVILLE, and in 1992, he directed the film version of  the classic theatre comedy NOISES OFF… with an all-star cast including Michael Caine, Carol Burnett, Christopher Reeve, and John Ritter. In 2002, he directed THE CAT’S MEOW (2002), which told the true story of a mysterious 1924 death on board the yacht of William Randolph Hearst, and starred Kirsten Dunst, Eddie Izzard, and Edward Herrmann. In 2004, he directed the hard-hitting docudrama HUSTLE, about baseball player Pete Rose, whose career was marred by gambling, and the three-hour ABC-TV special THE MYSTERY OF NATALIE WOOD.

It was in 2000 that Bogdanovich began his six-season run playing the psychiatrist to psychiatrist Lorraine Bracco on the epoch-making HBO Series "The Sopranos."

In 2006, Bogdanovich heavily revised his 1971 documentary, DIRECTED BY JOHN FORD, to include interviews with Ford fans Clint Eastwood, Martin Scorsese and Steven Spielberg; the film had its world premiere at the 2006 Telluride Film Festival. In 2007, he directed the highly praised four-hour documentary RUNNIN’ DOWN A DREAM: TOM PETTY AND THE HEARTBREAKERS, and won a Grammy for Best Long Form Music Video.

Bogdanovich has written more than a dozen books about films and filmmaking. His best-selling “Who the Devil Made It: Conversations with Legendary Film Directors” (1997) including Hitchcock, Hawks, Fritz Lang, and 13 others, established him as one of the best writers ever to chronicle the art form. His companion volume, “Who the Hell’s In It” features chapters on 25 stars he knew or worked with, including Cary Grant, John Wayne, James Stewart, James Cagney, Frank Sinatra and Marlon Brando. “This is Orson Welles,” published in 1992 and revised and expanded in 1998, features book-length conversations with the legendary actor and director. “Peter Bogdanovich’s Movie of the Week,” published in 1999, features recommendations for a year of classic films. His interview book, “John Ford,” has been in print continuously since it was first published in 1967.
 
Other of his awards include a British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) award and nomination, a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Denver International Film Institute, two Golden Globe nominations, a Los Angeles Film Critics Association (LAFCA) award, the William K. Everson Film History Award, a New York Film Critics Circle (NYFCC) award, and nominations from both the Writers Guild of America and Directors Guild of America. He has also received two honorary doctorates, from Fairleigh Dickinson University and Emerson College.

The RiverRun International Film Festival – of which UNCSA is a sponsor – announced earlier this week that Peter Bogdanovich will receive its Master of Cinema Award during the festival, which runs April 15-25 in Winston-Salem this year.

The University of North Carolina School of the Arts is the first state-supported, residential school of its kind in the nation. Established as the North Carolina School of the Arts by the N.C. General Assembly in 1963, UNCSA opened in Winston-Salem (“The City of the Arts”) in 1965 and became part of the University of North Carolina system in 1972. More than 1,100 students from middle school through graduate school train for careers in the arts in five professional schools: Dance, Design and Production (including a Visual Arts Program), Drama, Filmmaking, and Music. UNCSA is the state’s only public arts conservatory, dedicated entirely to the professional training of talented students in the performing, visual and moving image arts. Internationally renowned conductor John Mauceri has been chancellor of UNCSA since 2006. UNCSA is located at 1533 S. Main St., Winston-Salem. For more information, visit www.uncsa.edu.

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