The Fast and the Furious Director

Background:

"I never direct sequels to my films, ever. I didn’t direct the sequel to ‘Fast and the Furious’ (2001), I didn’t shoot the sequel to ‘Dragonheart’ (1996). I just don’t believe in it and I just think that life is short and there are many stories to tell." Rob Cohen

Starting out as a producer for such Motown Productions' classic hits as "Mahogany" (1975; starring Diana Ross), "The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars & Motor Kings" (1976), "Thank God It's Friday" (1978; starring Billy Dee Williams, James Earl Jones and Richard Pryor), and "The Wiz" (1978; starring Diana Ross, Michael Jackson, and Richard Pryor), Harvard-graduate Rob Cohen ventured to directing in the early 1980s and finally gained fame for his box office hits "The Fast and the Furious" (2001) and "xXx" (2002), both starring Vin Diesel.

Cohen also helmed "Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story" (1993; starring Jason Scott Lee), "Dragonheart" (1996; starring Dennis Quaid), "Daylight" (1996; starring Sylvester Stallone), the critically-acclaimed "The Rat Pack" (1998; TV), "The Skulls" (2000; starring Joshua Jackson, Paul Walker, and Leslie Bibb), and "Stealth" (2005; starring Jamie Foxx, Josh Lucas, and Jessica Biel). He is currently directing "The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor" and will direct and produce the upcoming biopic "King of the Nudies."

As a producer, Cohen, who has set up his own production company, has produced or executive produced numerous hit films, including “The Witches Of Eastwick” (1987; starring Jack Nicholson), “The Running Man” (starring 1987; Arnold Schwarzenegger), “The Serpent and The Rainbow” (1988; starring Bill Pullman), ”Bird On A Wire” (1990; starring Mel Gibson and Goldie Hawn), “Ironweed” (1987; starring Meryl Steep and Jack Nicholson), and “The Hard Way” (1991; starring Michael J. Fox).

The busy producer-director of film and TV was ranked #95 in Premiere's 2003 annual Power 100 List. He is married and the proud father of triplets and a son.

New Yorker

Childhood and Family:

In Cornwall, New York, Rob Cohen was born on March 12, 1949. He attended Amherst College, in Amherst, Massachusetts, before transferring to Harvard University, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he graduated with a BA degree in Anthropology in 1971.

Cohen is now married to Barbara Cohen, with whom he had triplets born on March 20, 2008, two daughters Jasi and Zoe (Jasi named after the village he revitalized in Indonesia), and son Sean. He also has one son from a previous relationship, Kyle Cohen (born in 1987), who appeared in Cohen's 1996 film "Dragonheart."

A collector of first edition books and avid surfer, Cohen has homes in Malibu, California, and Bali, Indonesia.

xXx

Career:

During his sophomore year at Harvard, aspiring filmmaker Rob Cohen began his career as an assistant to director Daniel Petrie on the Universal/NBC TV movie "Silent Night, Lonely Night" (1969). Following his graduation in 1971, Cohen headed to Los Angeles to work for a producer, but unfortunately, the producer went bankrupt and Cohen became unemployed. He temporarily worked as a janitor at an animal hospital before landing a job as a reader for the International Famous Agency (IFA).

After evaluating and recommending the script for the now-classic “The Sting” (1973), Cohen moved on to 20th Century Fox Television. There, he earned the title Director of TV Movies and developed such projects as the Western “Mrs. Sundance” (1974; starring Elizabeth Montgomery) and the novel-based “Stowaway to the Moon” (1975; starring Lloyd Bridges).

The 24-year-old Cohen was recruited by Berry Gordy in 1973 to be the executive vice president of the motion picture division of Motown Records. During his tenure there, Cohen produced the Diana Ross-starring feature film “Mahogany” (1975) and John Badham's “The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars & Motor Kings” (1976), starring Billy Dee Williams, James Earl Jones and Richard Pryor.

He also executive-produced the Jeremy Kagan-directed biopic about the musician and composer of ragtime music, "Scott Joplin" (1977; with Billy Dee Williams in the title role), and produced the only Motown theatrical feature not to center around African-American characters, "Almost Summer" (1978), which was directed by Martin Davidson and stars Bruno Kirby and Lee Purcell. Additionally, he produced the Academy Award-winning movie “Thank God It's Friday” (1978), which was directed by Robert Klane and features an early performance by Jeff Goldblum and the first major screen appearance by Debra Winger, and received the NAACP Image Award for Best Producer for producing the movie version of the Broadway musical “The Wiz,” featuring an entirely African-American cast that included Diana Ross, Michael Jackson, and Richard Pryor.

Afterward, Cohen left Motown to form his own production company, in which he produced or executive produced such films as John Byrum's "The Razor's Edge" (1984), the second film version of W. Somerset Maugham's 1944 novel starring Bill Murray, Theresa Russell, Catherine Hicks, Denholm Elliott and James Keach, Matthew Robbins' drama "The Legend of Billie Jean" (1985), starring Helen Slater and Christian Slater, writer/director Paul Schrader's "Light of Day" (1987), a drama starring Michael J. Fox, Gena Rowlands, and Joan Jett, and George Miller's feature film based on the novel by John Updike, "The Witches of Eastwick" (1987), starring Jack Nicholson, Cher, Susan Sarandon and Michelle Pfeiffer.

Cohen, who was appointed president of Keith Barish Productions in 1985, also served as producer or executive producer for Fred Dekker's comedy/horror "The Monster Squad" (1987; starring Duncan Regehr and Andre Gower), Paul Michael Glaser's film loosely based on the Stephen King novel, "The Running Man" (1987; starring Arnold Schwarzenegger), Argentine-born Brazilian director Hector Babenco's film based on the 1983 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by William Kennedy, "Ironweed" (1987; starring Meryl Streep), Wes Craven's horror film very loosely based on a non-fiction book by Wade Davis, "The Serpent and the Rainbow" (1988; starring Bill Pullman), and Jim Kouf's crime/comedy "Disorganized Crime" (1989; starring Fred Gwynne, Lou Diamond Phillips, Ruben Blades, William Russ, and Corbin Bernsen).

As a director, Cohen helmed several episodes of the popular and innovative NBC/USA Network television series starring Don Johnson and Philip Michael Thomas, "Miami Vice," the short-lived "Private Eye," ABC’s comedy-drama starring John Ritter, "Hooperman," two episodes of the award-winning ABC drama "thirtysomething," and the NBC dramatic miniseries "A Year in the Life." He also served as a writer for the Emmy Award-winning ABC "The Wonder Years," starring Fred Savage, and alongside longtime friend John Badham, he worked with MCA to form The Badham/Cohen Group in October 1988.

The 1990s saw Cohen direct the legal drama series "The Antagonists" (1991; starring Lauren Holly and David Andrews), the sci-fi drama series "The Guardian" (1997), which he also wrote, and the HBO TV movie "The Rat Pack" (1998), which featured Ray Liotta as Frank Sinatra, Joe Mantegna as Dean Martin, Don Cheadle as Sammy Davis, Jr., Angus Macfadyen as Peter Lawford and Bobby Slayton as Joey Bishop. The made-for-television movie later earned Cohen an Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Movies for Television nomination from the Directors Guild of America. He also wrote an episode of ABC’s animated series "Capitol Critters."

As for the big screen, Cohen directed Jason Scott Lee in the semi-fictionalized biographical film about martial arts actor Bruce Lee, "Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story" (1993), which has spawned a lesser-known fighting game of the same name. Three years later, he helmed "Dragonheart" (1996), a fantasy/adventure starring Dennis Quaid which received a Best Film nomination at the Sitges - Catalonian International Film Festival. He also directed Sylvester Stallone in the disaster film "Daylight" (1996), which won a Golden Reel Award for Best Sound Editing and was nominated for an Academy Award in the same category.

During this time, Cohen also served as producer for two John Badham's action/comedy films, "Bird on a Wire" (1990; starring Goldie Hawn and Mel Gibson) and "The Hard Way" (1991; starring James Woods and Michael J. Fox). He also executive-produced the TV movies "Relentless: Mind of a Killer" (1993), "Knight Rider 2010" (1994), "Vanishing Son" (1994), "Vanishing Son II" (1994), "Vanishing Son III" (1994), and "Vanishing Son IV" (1994).

Entering the new millennium, Cohen directed "The Skulls," a lame thriller based on some of the conspiracy theories surrounding Yale University's Skull and Bones student society. Starring Joshua Jackson, Paul Walker, and Leslie Bibb, the movie was critically panned, but successful enough to spawn two direct-to-video sequels, “The Skulls II” (2002), directed by Joe Chappelle and starring Robin Dunne, Ashley Lyn Cafagna, and “The Skulls III” (2003), directed by J. Miles Dale and starring Clare Kramer.

In 2001, Cohen wrote the screenplay for "Tales From the Crypt Presents: Ritual," the third film spin-off from the HBO television series starring Tim Curry, Jennifer Grey, and Craig Sheffer. That same year, he also directed "The Fast and the Furious," a car film starring Paul Walker and Vin Diesel. The film was met with mixed reviews but was an unexpected summer hit. It later spawned two sequels, "2 Fast 2 Furious" (2003), directed by John Singleton, and "The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift," helmed by Neal H. Moritz.

"I never expected it to be a blockbuster as it wasn't made it to be one. Until the first test-screening I didn't have any inkling it would have that potential. I knew that I was working in a worn-out genre, that had been over-stepped by mega-budget production, in 'Days of Thunder,' 'Gone in 60 Seconds,' 'Driven,' and so on. But I believed in the new sub-culture of illegal street racing, with its multi-ethnicity, and with this young cast, with a story that had character depth and soulfulness, as opposed to cars, cars, cars. We were approaching it differently. I looked at the other movies and thought 'They're not fast!' 'The Fast and the Furious' has a real representation of speed and that's what I set out to do." Rob Cohen

Following the success of "The Fast and the Furious" (2001), Cohen went on to direct "xXx" (2002), an action movie in which he was reunited with Vin Diesel, who stars as the titular law-breaker and extreme sports enthusiast. The film spun off a sequel, "XXX: State of the Union" (2005; starring Ice Cube and Willem Dafoe), which was directed by Lee Tamahori and executive-produced by Cohen.

Meanwhile, Cohen directed Gavin Rossdale’s music video "Adrenaline" (2002) and a documentary for German Industrial metal band Rammstein, "Rammstein: Lichtspielhaus" (2003). He also wrote the story and executive-produced the USA Network action drama movie "The Last Ride" (2004; starring Dennis Hopper, Will Patton, Nadine Velazquez and Fred Ward) and helmed the box office bomb action/adventure thriller "Stealth" (2005), starring Jamie Foxx, Josh Lucas, and Jessica Biel.

"'Stealth' is unlike anything you’ve ever seen because you’re not watching flying, you are flying. You’re not watching speed, you’re speeding. And the acting in it is superb." Rob Cohen

Cohen will soon complete filming on his upcoming project, "The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor," an action/adventure that follows "The Mummy" (1999) and "The Mummy Returns" (2001). In the film, slated for release on August 1, 2008, Brendan Fraser returns as explorer Rick O'Connell while Rachel Weisz is replaced by Maria Bello to portray his wife Evelyn.

Cohen will also direct and produce "King of the Nudies," a biographical drama about filmmaker Russ Meyer who has directed a series of cult favorites, low-budget sexploitation films (including "The Immoral Mr. Teas," "Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Vixens," and "Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!").

Awards:
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