User:Joshwand/sandbox/Jerrold Freedman

Jerrold Freedman (aka J.F. Freedman) is an award-winning film-maker and international best-selling author.

As a film-maker, he has written, directed, and produced numerous television and theatrical movies and television series, including The X-Files, Kojak, The Bold Ones, and Night Gallery, and the pilot for the original MacGyver.

Writing under his initials, J. F. Freedman, he has published a dozen novels which have been translated into more than twenty languages and have sold over a million copies.

Early Life and Education
Jerrold Frank Freedman was born on October 29, 1941, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He is the oldest of three children; his brother is David Freedman, a lawyer, and his sister is Sara Freedman, an educator.

In 1947, the Freedman family relocated to the town of Bladensburg, in Prince Georges County, Maryland. Freedman attended the local schools for twelve years, graduating from high school in 1959. He then went to the University of Pennsylvania, receiving a BA in English Literature and an MA in Communications from the university’s Annenberg School of Communication. As an undergraduate he shared the school’s creative writing award with MacArthur Genius Grant winner John Edgar Wideman. One of his classmates and friends at Annenberg was famed photographer Mary Ellen Mark. During his time at Annenberg, Freedman directed public service programs at television station WHYY. After graduation he served in the U.S. Army as a medical lab technician, stationed at Ft. Knox, KY.

Television and Movies
After leaving the Army, Freedman was hired by the head of Universal Studios, Lew Wasserman, to be a television production trainee. Among his mentors were renowned film-maker John Cassavetes, director Stuart Rosenberg (Cool Hand Luke), producer Roy Huggins (Maverick, The Fugitive), and Emmy and Academy Award-winning writer Abby Mann (Judgment at Nuremberg, Atlanta Child Murders). Four years later, Sidney Sheinberg, head of Universal Television, selected Freedman to produce The Protectors, part of The Bold Ones television cycle. At that time he was the youngest producer in television.

When The Protectors ended, Freedman wrote the pilot script for the television series The Psychiatrist. The teleplay was nominated for an Emmy for Best Writing for a Drama Series. Freedman produced the series. He also wrote and directed episodes of the show, one of which, Par For The Course, which he co-wrote with his associate producer, Bo May, won the Writer’s Guild of America award for best dramatic episode. During that period Freedman also wrote and directed episodes of The Senator, Night Gallery and Kojak.

(Par For The Course was directed by a young friend of Freedman’s, Steven Spielberg. They met when Spielberg was seventeen. A few years later, Spielberg signed a long-term directing deal with Universal. After directing a segment of the Night Gallery pilot, Spielberg wasn’t able to get other producers to hire him, until Freedman did for The Psychiatrist. From there Spielberg went on to direct the landmark television movie Duel, which led to his association with the Zanuck/Brown production company, and Jaws followed.)

After leaving Universal, Freedman wrote, directed, and produced over twenty theatrical and television films. Among the notable actors Freedman directed were Robert Mitchum, Charles Bronson, Ben Johnson, Eli Wallach, Joanne Woodward, Ed Harris, Hal Holbrook, Oprah Winfrey, Elizabeth McGovern, Matt Dillon, Robert Urich, Wilford Brimley, and Geraldine Page.

Literary Career
In 1987, Freedman took a creative writing extension course at UCSB. Over the next three years, when not working on television and film projects, Freedman completed the novel he’d started in the class. In 1990, Against The Wind was sold to Penguin Books after a spirited auction. An article in the Wall Street Journal stated that the advance payment Against The Wind was the highest ever given to a first-time novelist. It became an international best-seller. Since then, Freedman has published many highly-regarded best-selling books, including House Of Smoke, The Disappearance, Above The Law, and Bird’s-Eye View. His most recent book, The Deer Killer, was published in 2020.

Personal Life
Freedman and his wife, award-winning novelist Christine Bell (The Perez Family, Grievance), live on the central California coast.