Stuart Samuels

Stuart Samuels

Deceased · Born: Mar 8, 1940 · Died: Aug 2, 2024

Personal Details

BornMar 8, 1940 New York City, New York, USA

Biography

Stuart Samuels is a renowned academic, film and television producer, writer, and award-winning documentary filmmaker. He earned his Ph.D from Stanford University in 1967 and did post-graduate work at Oxford University. Samuels was a professor of history at the University of Pennsylvania from 1968 to 1981, where he pioneered the teaching of cultural history using feature films.

He created and taught the first educational course at the Cannes Film Festival from 1976 to 1981, using the festival as a classroom with seminars, film showings, and related activities. Samuels then left academia and joined ATI Video to write and produce the groundbreaking late-night music video series Night Flight for the USA Network.

In 1986, Samuels teamed up with Zbigniew Rybczynski to produce the first High Definition music videos in the US for Herb Alpert, Mick Jagger, John Lennon, and Supertramp. Their work, The Orchestra, won several awards, including an Emmy for Best Visual Effects.

Samuels' first feature documentary, Visions of Light: The Art of Cinematography, was selected as "Best Documentary" of 1993 by the New York, Boston, and National Film Critics. It was also selected for several major film festivals, including Cannes, Edinburgh, London, Telluride, Toronto, New York, Tokyo, and Sundance.

He co-directed and co-wrote the award-winning documentary Hollywoodism: Jews, Movies and the American Dream, which was based on the book by Neal Gabler. Samuels was named Best Feature Documentary director at Hot Docs and Hollywoodism was named Best Documentary at the 1998 Jerusalem Film Festival.

Samuels' feature documentary, Midnight Movies: From the Margin to the Mainstream, was based on his 1993 book Midnight Movies. The film had its world premiere at the 2005 Cannes Film Festival and was also selected as the opening night film at Silverdoc's 2005.

In 2011, Samuels produced, directed, and wrote RasTa: A Soul's Journey, a feature documentary film on the relationship of Bob Marley and Rastafarian beliefs. He is also a Co-Producer on a feature documentary about The Beatles live tours and performances, with Ron Howard directing.

Career

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2023
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2016
Night Flight: Born Again
Night Flight: Born Again as Director, Writer
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2006
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1998
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1992