Susan Seidelman

In the same year Seidelman was a member of the jury at the 44th Berlin International Film Festival.

Susan Seidelman (born December 11, 1952) is an American film director, producer, and writer.

Seidelman was born on December 11, 1952 in Abington, Pennsylvania and raised in a suburb of Philadelphia, the oldest daughter of a hardware manufacturer and a teacher.

She graduated from Abington Senior High School in 1969, and studied fashion and arts at Drexel University in Philadelphia.

After taking a film appreciation class where she was inspired by the French New Wave, particularly the films of Jean-Luc Godard and François Truffaut, as well as Ingmar Bergman, she switched her focus to filmmaking.

Her first foray into movie-making at New York University resulted in a Student Academy Award Nomination for her satirical short film about a housewife's affair, And You Act Like One Too.

Seidelman earned an MFA from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts and is an adjunct professor in the school's film department, overseeing students' thesis films.

Seidelman was inspired early on by European film directors Lina Wertmüller and Agnès Varda, whose work she studied in college during the 1970s—a time when there were very few female directors active in the American film industry.

Seidelman's subsequent movies of the 1980s were Making Mr. Right (1987), a romantic sci-fi comedy starring Ann Magnuson and John Malkovich, who played dual roles as both a socially awkward scientist and his lovesick android creation; Cookie (1989), a father-daughter mafia comedy starring Peter Falk, Dianne Wiest, and Emily Lloyd, written by Nora Ephron and Alice Arlen; and She-Devil (also 1989), the film version of Fay Weldon's bestselling novel, with Meryl Streep in her first comedic movie role and Roseanne Barr in her first feature-film role.

She first came to notice with Smithereens (1982), the earliest American independent feature to be screened in competition at the Cannes Film Festival.

Seidelman made her feature-film debut with Smithereens (1982), a bleak and darkly humorous look at New York City's downtown Bohemian scene of the 1980s.

It was shot on 16mm for $40,000 on location, at times "guerrilla style" on the streets and in the subways of New York.

Smithereens captured the look of the post-punk music scene and was the first American independent film to be selected for competition at the Cannes Film Festival.

With recognition from Cannes, Seidelman became a member of the first wave of 80s-era independent filmmakers in the American cinema.

Her next feature, Desperately Seeking Susan (1985), co-starred Madonna in her first film, and was named as one of 100 greatest films directed by women by the BBC; it resulted in a Cesar Award nomination.

Seidelman's second theatrical film Desperately Seeking Susan (1985), featuring then-rising star Madonna, was a major box-office and critical success, launching the careers of co-stars Rosanna Arquette and Aidan Quinn and introducing a new generation of actors and performers such as John Turturro, Laurie Metcalf, Robert Joy, Mark Blum, Giancarlo Esposito, and comedian Steven Wright.

Seidelman encouraged her producers to cast Madonna, who was a neighbor of hers with no acting experience, believing she would lend downtown authenticity and charisma to the role.

She-Devil (1989) starred Meryl Streep in her first starring comedic film role and Roseanne Barr in her first feature-film role.

Her work on the short film The Dutch Master resulted in an Academy Award nomination.

Seidelman's subsequent films mix comedy with drama, blending genres and pop-cultural references with a focus on women protagonists, particularly outsiders.

She also works in television and directed the pilot episode of Sex and the City.

In the 1990s and 2000s Seidelman garnered success as a television director, helming the pilot of Sex and the City, which involved some casting and developing the look and feel of the show.

Seidelman thought the pilot script by Darren Star was bold, presenting then-taboo subject matter with humor, saying, "It was the first time that a TV show featured women talking about things they really talk about in private."

She directed subsequent episodes during the show's first season.

Seidelman has two Emmy nominations for the Showtime film A Cooler Climate, starring Sally Field and Judy Davis and written by Pulitzer Prize-winner Marsha Norman.

She has also directed episodes of Comedy Central's cult hit Stella and PBS's The Electric Company.

In 1994, Seidelman and screenwriter Jonathan Brett received an Academy Award nomination for a short film they co-wrote and co-produced called The Dutch Master.

The film was part of the series "Erotic Tales" produced by Regina Ziegler and was screened at both the Cannes Film Festival and Telluride Film Festival.

Seidelman returned to feature films with Gaudi Afternoon (2001), a gender-bending detective story set in Barcelona, starring Judy Davis, Marcia Gay Harden, Juliette Lewis and Lili Taylor.

The screenplay by James Myhre was based on the book Gaudi Afternoon: A Cassandra Reilly Mystery by Barbara Wilson.

Her film Boynton Beach Club (2005) was based on an original idea by her mother, Florence Seidelman, who while living in South Florida had gathered true stories of senior citizens who were suddenly back in the "dating game" after the loss of a spouse.

It's one of the first movies to deal with sexuality and the aging Baby Boomer generation and had a theatrical run and acclaim at U.S. film festivals.

The ensemble cast featured studio veterans Brenda Vaccaro, Dyan Cannon, Sally Kellerman, Joseph Bologna, Michael Nouri and Len Cariou.

Seidelman's next film Musical Chairs (2011) opened in limited release.

The story is set in the South Bronx and Manhattan and revolves around a couple taking part in a wheelchair ballroom dancing competition after the woman becomes disabled.

The film had its premiere at Lincoln Center's Dance on Camera Festival and played at the New York International Latino Film Festival, the Miami International Film Festival, and the Havana International Film Festival, among others.

Seidelman's film The Hot Flashes (2013) is about middle-aged women living in small-town Texas, all former 1980s basketball champs, reuniting to challenge the current girls' high school team to raise funds for a breast-cancer treatment center.

It starred Brooke Shields, Daryl Hannah, Wanda Sykes, Virginia Madsen, Camryn Manheim, and Eric Roberts.

Seidelman's short film "Cut in Half" (2017) focuses on two Muslim sisters who must come to terms with the eldest sister's leukemia diagnosis, her feelings about continuing chemotherapy, and the decision between life and death.

It starred Déa Julien, and Ajna Jai.