Joel Gallen

Joel Gallen is an American director and producer.

He is the founder of Tenth Planet Productions, a Los Angeles-based film and television production company.

He produced and directed The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 25th Anniversary Concert in addition to 20 of its induction ceremonies.

He also produced and directed stand-up shows and comedy specials for Comedy Central and HBO, directed Not Another Teen Movie, and executive produced the film Zoolander, which was based on a VH-1 Fashion Awards short film.

In 1989 Gallen was named head of production for MTV.

During his first year at the network, he served as the producer of the Video Music Awards and the executive producer of MTV Unplugged, which he helped to develop.

Gallen said: "The real big win for Unplugged (was) we got the big arena acts to strip down and go acoustic."

Among others, Paul McCartney, Eric Clapton, Pearl Jam, R.E.M., Elton John and LL Cool J performed.

McCartney released an Unplugged album, as did Clapton, whose Unplugged album went 26x platinum and became the best-selling live album of all time.

Gallen produced the VMAs from 1990-1993.

Approaching the broadcast as "a rock n' roll show first and a television show second," the 1992 VMAs featured Nirvana, Guns N' Roses, Pearl Jam, The Black Crowes, and Def Leppard, among others.

In his book Your Favorite Band is Killing Me, Steven Hyden wrote: "The 1992 VMAs were the fulcrum between the ’80s and ’90s, a show where you could actually watch one era end and another begin in real time."

In 1992, Gallen created the MTV Movie Awards.

Irreverent in tone, Gallen said it was the opposite of the Oscars.

"We wanted to have some fun with it and come up with categories that our audience cared about.” The categories included "Best Kiss", "Best Villain" and "Best Fight." "A hilarious spoof of the Oscars and a celebration of movies," Gallen developed, directed and produced the short film parodies that became a signature of the MTV Movie Awards; they included Sarah Jessica Parker in Sex and The Matrix and Ben Stiller as Tom Cruise's stunt double in Mission: Improbable. Jack Black, Will Ferrell, Samuel L. Jackson and Justin Timberlake, among others, also appeared in the MTV Movie Awards film parodies.

Mainly interested in directing and producing, Gallen's management role at MTV kept him from working in the trenches of production.

In December 1993, he left MTV and moved from New York to Los Angeles, where he founded Tenth Planet Productions.

At the time, he had two series in development—one for HBO and one for ABC—and a special in development at Fox.

He continued to work in association with MTV, executive producing and directing the Movie Awards from 1995 through 2006 and in 2018.

He also executive produced and directed the VH1 Fashion Awards from 1996-1998.

Gallen and head writer Drake Sather created the "professionally good-looking supermodel Derek Zoolander" for Ben Stiller for a Fashion Awards short film.

Four days after the September 11 attacks Gallen was enlisted by the heads of the four major television networks to produce and direct America: A Tribute to Heroes, a benefit to raise money for victims of the 9/11 attacks.

In 2001, Gallen produced and directed America: A Tribute to Heroes, a charity telethon and concert that raised money for victims of the 9/11 attacks.

With no live audience, no celebrity introductions, and sparse staging, the production design became a template for charity concerts and events.

Gallen created the MTV Movie Awards and the comedic short films that became their signature.

Gallen has received 14 Primetime Emmy nominations over the course of his career, from a 2001 nomination for Ellen DeGeneres' HBO special, The Beginning, to two 2023 nominations for Chris Rock's livestreamed Netflix special, Selective Outrage.

Gallen was born in Detroit, Michigan and raised in Rockville Centre, New York.

He attended the University of Rhode Island, where as a member of the school's entertainment committee, he booked on-campus concerts by artists including Charlie Daniels, The J. Geils Band and Andy Kaufman.

He also dj'd on the school's radio station, WRIU.

He graduated with a BS in marketing.

After working in the mailroom at ICM, Gallen was hired by a television syndication company, George Back and Associates (later known as All-American Television).

Over the next four years, Gallen marketed, syndicated and produced television shows, including the Uncle Floyd Show, a New Jersey basic cable program that Back and Gallen syndicated to NBC affiliates.

Gallen's first job in production, his role included booking musical guests such as the Ramones, Paul Simon and Blue Öyster Cult.

Gallen believed there was a substantial audience for music videos by artists from the 60s and 70s, and as MTV (and the videos by new artists it programmed) became increasingly popular, he created and produced Deja View, two one-hour specials composed of original music videos for older hit songs, often featuring the original artists.

The video for Sly and the Family Stone's Everyday People" starred Sly Stone; "Good Lovin'" starred Felix Cavaliere; "Bus Stop featured Graham Nash; and The Beach Boys hit "Don't Worry Baby" starred Brian Wilson.

Actors also appeared in Deja View videos -- "A Whiter Shade of Pale" featured Harry Dean Stanton (as well as Bernie Taupin), and She's Not There starred Teri Garr.

Hosted by John Sebastian of The Lovin' Spoonful, the specials were sponsored by Lincoln-Mercury.

Gallen subsequently produced A Soul Session: James Brown and Friends; a Cinemax special taped at a small club in Detroit, it featured Brown and Aretha Franklin.

He also produced the American version of the long-running UK music show, Top of the Pops. Unlike the British program, where bands lip-synced to their music, he had the artists play live.

Among others, David Bowie, Bryan Adams, Sting, INXS, Belinda Carlisle and Depeche Mode performed on the show, which aired on CBS for 26 weeks.