With no job, no wife, and no family, Warren is desperate to find something meaningful in his thoroughly unimpressive life. He sets out on journey of self-discovery, exploring his roots across Nebraska in the 35-foot motor home in which he had planned to drive around the country with his late wife. His ultimate destination is Denver, where he hopes to bridge the gulf between himself and his somewhat estranged daughter by arriving early to help with her wedding preparations. Unfortunately, he hates the groom-to-be Randall (Dermot Mulroney), a profoundly mediocre, underachieving waterbed salesman. To make matters worse, Warren is appalled by the free-spirited nature and boorish behavior of his soon-to-be in-laws (Kathy Bates and Howard Hesseman). Warren grows swiftly convinced that his new purpose in life is to stop his daughter's marriage.

Throughout his journey, Warren details his adventures and shares his observations with an unexpected new friend and confessor -- Ndugu Umbo, a six-year-old Tanzanian orphan whom he sponsors for $22 a month through an organization that advertises on TV. From these long letters filled with a lifetime of things unsaid, Warren begins -- perhaps for the first time -- to glimpse himself and the life he has lived.

Directed by Alexander Payne from a screenplay by Payne and Jim Taylor, the team behind the Oscar-nominated Election, About Schmidt is a wryly observed slice of American life. Produced by Harry Gittes (Breaking In, Little Nikita, Goin' South) and Michael Besman (Bounce, The Opposite of Sex), the film is executive produced by Bill Badalato (Men of Honor, Unstrung Heroes).

About Schmidt (rated R) will be released in New York, Los Angeles and Omaha on December 13th, 2002 and will expand on December 20th, 2002 and January 3rd, 2003.

ABOUT THE PRODUCTION

On the heels of their first two films -- Citizen Ruth, a comedy set in the world of abortion protesting, and Election, a savagely funny look at high school student council politics -- comes About Schmidt, a wryly observed tale of an alienated sixty-six-year-old man.

When Election was released in 1999, Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor were recognized as "perhaps the only true social satirists now working in American movies" (David Denby, 4/26/99). Payne and Taylor's characters would stick out like sore thumbs in a line up of major motion picture heroes. They don't even qualify as anti-heroes -- they're just people like everyone else, normal people with selfishness, petty ambitions, and uncertain ethics. "I know that Jim and I feel very acutely the pathetic side of our own lives, and we try to turn it into the stuff of comedy," says writer/director Payne. Co-writer Jim Taylor adds, "Most true comedy comes out of pain, out of some uncomfortable situation."

WHAT ABOUT WARREN SCHMIDT?

"He's just a nice Midwestern guy who has played by the rules he was instructed to play by," says Payne. "What interested me was taking everything away from the man -- his career, his marriage, his daughter, his fatherhood, all the institutions that had given him some semblance of meaning. Without those things, maybe a man is forced to find the bedrock of who he really is. And maybe at his age it's too late. Maybe he lacks the necessary tools anyway."

"I also like the idea of a crossroads in a person's life," Payne continues. "It's a time when you're passing from one phase of your life into another, and in the best scenario you're supposed to feel proud and be looking forward to what is to come, but all you really usually feel is emptiness and alienation. And alienation is good fodder for comedy."

Payne had in fact written an earlier script for Universal that covered similar ground called The Coward. "I'd started it in film school," he recalls, "and finished it for a studio, but they weren't interested in making it. I went on to make two other films, but I never forgot about it. And ultimately I was able to combine it in with ideas from Louis Begley's About Schmidt."

About Schmidt is the synthesis of that early The Coward screenplay and the novel About Schmidt by Louis Begley. Producers Harry Gittes and Michael Besman had envisioned the project with Jack Nicholson from the start. Besman gave Gittes the book to read. "I liked it immediately for Jack," says Gittes, who had produced Goin' South for Nicholson, a film which Nicholson directed as well as starred in. "About Schmidt is all about human behavior, and human behavior is what Jack Nicholson is all about."

Besman, whose background includes years as a studio executive, had a well-honed skepticism about the likelihood of getting an actor of Nicholson's stature to even read the book, never mind agree to be in the film. As Besman recalls, "Harry read it pretty quickly and said 'It's great. It's great for Jack.' I just figured, 'Nothing will ever happen,' because it almost never does. A few weeks later Harry came back and said 'Jack loves the book.'"

Jack Nicholson is one of a few figures in Hollywood whose name is sufficient to conjure up a bevy of images - the detective J.J. Gittes, the sailor, the young Southern lawyer, the crafty mental patient, the retired astronaut, the obsessive-compulsive cantankerous writer, the belligerent Marine colonel, and the Joker. He is truly an icon, an actor with one of the most distinctive careers in Hollywood.

"Alexander is a huge fan of '70s movies and '70s filmmaking," says producer Harry Gittes. "Alexander the filmmaker is a throwback to the time when after you went to a movie, you went out and had a coffee to talk about it. Your whole evening would be built around going to the movie and discussing it. Alexander wants to make movies that make you think."

Payne and Taylor sat down to adapt the novel with the intention of borrowing a few things from Payne's The Coward. But as they went along, they found themselves using more and more material from the earlier script, including Schmidt's lengthy correspondence with Ndugu, the six-year-old Tanzanian child whom he sponsors through an organization. By the time they were finished, it was a melding of The Coward and the novel.

"When Alexander showed us his changes," says producer Michael Besman, "we were blown away. What he'd done was make it his own."

ABOUT THE CASTING

Academy award-winning actress Kathy Bates has managed to pull off some amazingly swift turns in her career. "There aren't many actors around who can do what Kathy Bates can do," says producer Harry Gittes. "She's an unbelievable actress. We were really lucky." In what Gittes calls nothing short of a "miracle from heaven," the filmmakers managed to overcome a series of obstacles, including the scheduling of another movie and the threat of an actors' strike, to secure Bates' participation in the film as Roberta Hertzel, the mother of Warren Schmidt's future son-in-law.

Kathy Bates' response to the script was immediate. "I was so moved by it," says Bates. "One of the threads of the story that I enjoyed were the letters that Warren sends to the little orphan boy in Africa." Bates describes her character: "She truly considers herself to be a real artist, although her ex says otherwise. Roberta is also very comfortable with who she is. She loves to talk about all kinds of things that most people don't want to hear about, including her overwhelming sexuality, because Jack's character is just the opposite. The scenes between them were a lot of fun to play and fun to watch."

Bates' character represents a direct challenge to Warren Schmidt's sensibilities. "We were looking for someone who could take Jack on," says Besman. "Kathy Bates immediately came to mind."

Bates particularly enjoyed working with production designer Jane Ann Stewart to create Roberta's home environment. "I love the colors that everything was painted -- orange, deep oranges and reds," says Bates, "colors that I actually like in a house. Also, I have a harp that I have been trying to learn how to play for years and years, so we thought it would be funny if Roberta had one in the middle of all of her painting stuff."

"I had that rare feeling that I'd be willing to do anything to be in this movie," says Howard Hesseman, who plays Larry Hertzel, Roberta's ex-husband. Hope Davis, who plays Schmidt's daughter, concurs. "It was just such a beautifully written script and so spare. I was after Alexander Payne for months after I read it."

In addition to Howard and Hope, Payne cast Dermot Mulroney as Jeannie's fiancé Randall Hertzel. Mulroney was so determined to be in the movie that he shaved his head for the part, in essence becoming Randall before negotiations were finalized. During production, the younger female visitors to the set refused to believe that Mulroney, with the cascading mullet, acid-washed jeans, Jerry Garcia tie and black Reeboks, was in fact the same leading man they had swooned over in My Best Friend's Wedding.

Rounding out the cast is a pair of veterans of the Broadway stage. June Squibb, who played Electra in the original Broadway production of Gypsy, plays Schmidt's wife Helen. And two-time Tony nominee Len Cariou, who most recently starred in a Broadway production of Neil Simon's The Dinner Party and in the touring company of Copenhagen, plays Schmidt's best friend Ray Nichols.

ABOUT FILMING ABOUT SCHMIDT

In addition to returning in Omaha, Nebraska, to shoot his films, Alexander Payne favors familiarity when assembling his creative team. Besides production designer Jane Ann Stewart, there is cinematographer James Glennon, editor Kevin Tent, composer Rolfe Kent, casting directors Lisa Beach and John Jackson, and much of the crew. Observant Payne fans can even spot a few familiar faces in the cast of About Schmidt. Payne feels lucky to have developed a sort of creative family who help realize his vision and distinctive style of filmmaking.

Wendy Chuck, costume designer on both About Schmidt and Election, says, "He likes everything to look as far away from Hollywood as it could possibly be. More than other directors, he likes to use real people in their real clothes."

Along with designer wardrobes, Payne eschews many staples of Hollywood production. Working closely with local casting director John Jackson, Payne casts many parts from local people -- housewives, insurance salesmen, students and other Nebraskans. Comments Payne, "I rather enjoy thinking of all of the professional actors who might clamor to be in a movie with Jack Nicholson, and here in Omaha I get people more or less off the street."

His penchant for realism often takes the glamour out of the glamour business. "To work with Alexander Payne," producer Harry Gittes advises, "you cannot be afraid to really strip yourself of any pretense, of glamour. Most people go out of their way to avoid looking like that, and these actors are signing up for it."

Costume designer Chuck, whose work begins early on in the production process, explains, "Very often I find that I have the first conversation with the actors after they've been cast. I bring the news of how Alexander sees things, how he works. It's 'check your ego at the door.' You've got to give up any idea of what's beautiful or what's acceptable because that's what it's about when you work with him. And I applaud the actors who are willing to do that."

As Hope Davis explains about her character Jeannie, "She works at the shipping and receiving department for a computer company. She's not someone who has much interest in the world of fashion." More Eddie Bauer than Dolce & Gabbana, Hope says her wardrobe suited her character just fine. "You put on the Hush Puppies and the rhinestone headband and, you know, the character is there. The Hush Puppies alone can really send me into another dimension."

Jack Nicholson's career is a rare example of substance over style. "He simply doesn't care about the way he looks," Roman Polanski once remarked. "With Jack, it's only the results that count." Producer Harry Gittes says that Nicholson has a general philosophy about life's inevitabilities: "It's one of the things I've always really loved about Jack. When he realized, early in his life, that he was going to lose his hair, his response was to show everybody that he was losing his hair. To get it out there in front of everybody, to accent it, to get it over with."

"It's simply that the style of these Omaha films demands a certain degree of realism, of trying to recreate what I see in real life, not the supposed realism of other movies," says Payne. "And I make a point of it not for its own sake but rather only to the extent that one must fight a number of stubborn assumptions about how American movies are supposed to look - that hair should be always combed and perfect, that cars are always new and clean, that everything should be made pretty and camera-ready. Only 'positive' things are somehow worthy of being filmed. And then, of course, your characters should be 'likeable,' and you must have an ending that resolves or redeems everything and just entertains. I honestly don't understand it."

But Payne goes to great lengths to create an environment in which his actors feel comfortable to allow the complexity of human nature to emerge. "That's the director's number one job in making the film -- to make everyone else feel comfortable in what they're doing," he says. "It's hard to be yourself with that camera. I have incredible respect for film actors. The really good ones have a very special relationship with the camera. It's almost as though they're able to tell the camera things they can't tell any single real person."

Pauline Kael once said of Jack Nicholson: "He lets you see into him, rather than controlling what he lets you see." Fellow actor Harvey Keitel noted: "…there are hundreds of people inside him, a whole world." Producer Harry Gittes, who has watched Nicholson on and off the screen for over forty years, says of Nicholson's Schmidt, "It's just amazing to still be surprised by a friend. I've known him for so long, and I see other characters when he's fooling around, but I've never seen this particular guy - Warren Schmidt. He's Jack in a way you've never seen before."

"Jack surprised me every day with how good he is," says Payne. "He's clearly one of the greatest film actors of our first hundred years of cinema. Still, when we worked I did not see all his other films in him. I simply saw this actor doing this part. When he's acting, you can see thoughts ripple across his face. Even a blink or a look away has some decision to it, some specificity. And the accumulation of those specific moments makes for great complexity in what he's doing."

"My favorite stuff in the film is when he's alone and depressed," says Payne. "I like watching people alone. I'm much happier shooting a person alone in a space feeling something than I am shooting the interaction with someone else. Screenwriters don't write that stuff too much. You always have that pressure 'Oh, they're not talking.' Or 'Let's get to the dialogue.' That's unfortunate. I like to see what people do when they're alone."

ABOUT OMAHA

Payne is always asked why he chooses to set films in Omaha. Says Payne: "You wouldn't ask Martin Scorsese or Spike Lee or Woody Allen, 'Why New York?' Or Quentin Tarantino, 'Why LA?' It just happens they're from there. Well, I'm from Omaha. Movies shot in LA or New York - by their sheer numbers -- are offered up as examples of American culture, as if this is what Americans do, and the only reason for it is that film people live there. But American life is atypical in Los Angeles and New York. There's a huge continent in between."

One writer commented that his two previous films "might be called Midwestern comedies - sardonic films about the moral perils of flatness." (David Denby, 4/99)

Payne has given us a glance at the often painful truths about ourselves, and he has done it with humor and poignancy.

If nobody seems very happy in Omaha, it isn't that the director is taking a native son's revenge or tending some comprehensive statement about life in America; its just Payne making the point that life is fundamentally a droning tragedy whose acts are in the best of circumstances, separated by moments of high and low comedy.
(Manohla Dargis)

ABOUT CHILDREACH

Childreach is a worthy non-profit organization that provides sponsorship for children all over the world. At the end of their three-month shoot, the About Schmidt company and crew took up a sizeable donation for the real-life Ndugu used in the film. Ndugu was his movie name, but the sponsorship is real. To learn more about Childreach, please visit www.childreach.org.

ABOUT THE CAST

JACK NICHOLSON's (Warren Schmidt) distinguished body of work includes some of the most successful and highly acclaimed films of all time. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor for As Good As It Gets and One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and for Best Supporting Actor for Terms of Endearment. He earned nominations for his performances in A Few Good Men, Prizzi's Honor, Reds, Ironweed, Chinatown, The Last Detail, Five Easy Pieces and Easy Rider.

Nicholson starred in the drama The Pledge, Blood and Wine, and the sci-fi comedy Mars Attacks!, and re-created his role as womanizing astronaut Garrett Breedlove opposite Shirley MacLaine in The Evening Star, the sequel to Terms of Endearment. Among his other credits are Batman, The Crossing Guard, Wolf, Hoffa, The Witches of Eastwick, The Postman Always Rings Twice and The Shining. In 1995 Nicholson was honored with the American Film Institute's Lifetime Achievement Award.

Academy Award winner KATHY BATES (Roberta Hertzel) initially earned her reputation as an actress of infinite range in the theatre. An Obie Award winner for her performance as Frankie in the original off-Broadway production of Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune, Bates also received the Los Angeles Drama Critics award for Best Actress in the Mark Taper Forum Production of the play. She garnered a Tony Award nomination for her portrayal of the suicidal daughter in Marsha Norman's Pulitzer Prize-winning 'night, Mother, and she won the Dramalogue Award. Born in Memphis, Tennessee, Bates attended Southern Methodist University in Dallas and worked in regional theatre in Washington, D.C., and at Actors Theatre in Louisville. Her first major play in New York was Vanities. She subsequently appeared in an impressive lineup of productions including Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean (a role she reprised in Robert Altman's film adaptation), Fifth of July and Curse of the Starving Class (another role she reprised for film). She also starred as the South African Schoolteacher Elsa Barlow in the off-Broadway production of The Road to Mecca, playing opposite the author, Athol Fugard.

Bates has created an indelible impression in such widely acclaimed films as Misery (1990), for which she won the Best Actress Academy Award; James Cameron's Academy Award-winning Titanic (1997); the critically acclaimed Dolores Claiborne (1994); and Jon Avnet's Fried Green Tomatoes (1991), which earned her a Golden Globe nomination. Other film credits include Diabolique (1996), The War at Home (1996), Shadows and Fog (1992), Prelude to a Kiss (1992), Used People (1992), At Play in the Fields of the Lord (1991), White Palace (1991), Dick Tracy (1990), Men Don't Leave (1990), Straight Time (1978) and Milos Forman's Taking Off (1971).

In 1999, she was nominated for an Oscar for her role as Libby Holden in Mike Nichols's Primary Colors (1998). Bates also earned a Golden Globe nomination and won the coveted Screen Actors Guild Award for her portrayal of the hard-nosed political troubleshooter. In the fall of 1999, Bates directed her first feature film, Dash and Lilly, starring Sam Shepard, Judy Davis and Bebe Neuwirth, which premiered on A&E and was nominated for multiple Emmy Awards, including one for Best Director. She was also seen as Adam Sandler's protective mother in the box office hit The Waterboy. Her work on television includes Roe V. Wade (1986) with Holly Hunter and Amy Madigan, and Johnny Bull (1986), opposite Jason Robards and Colleen Dewhurst. For her performance as Helen Kushnick in the HBO telefilm The Late Shift (1996), she won a Golden Globe, a Screen Actors Guild Award and an American Comedy Award. "Great Performances" on PBS aired her directorial debut, a segment of Talking With..., in 1995. Her directorial credits also include NBC's Homicide, ABC's NYPD Blue and HBO's Oz and Six Feet Under. Entertainment Weekly voted her one of the "25 Greatest Actresses of the '90s".

HOPE DAVIS (Jeannie) was most recently seen opposite Anthony Hopkins in Hearts in Atlantis, based on a Stephen King novella and directed by Scott Hicks.
Prior to that she starred in USA Films' Joe Gould's Secret, directed by Stanley Tucci; and opposite Jeff Bridges, Tim Robbins and Joan Cusack in the political thriller Arlington Road; as well as Lawrence Kasdan's Mumford, and the critically acclaimed Next Stop Wonderland, which debuted at the 1998 Sundance Film Festival and received a nomination for the Grand Jury Prize. She was also seen in Stanley Tucci's The Impostors.

It was her outstanding performance in the independent films The Daytrippers and The Myth of Fingerprints that garnered Davis the most attention. Her additional film credits also include the comedy Mr. Wrong, Barbet Schroeder's Kiss of Death and Joel Schumacher's Flatliners.

On stage, Davis most recently appeared in a production of Spinning Into Butter at Lincoln Center Theater. Davis's theater credits include Ivanov, opposite Kevin Kline; Two Shakespearean Actors at the Lincoln Center Theater; and Camino Real at the famed Williamstown Theater Festival.

Davis has also appeared in numerous Off-Broadway plays including Pterodactyls, The Food Chain, The Iceman Cometh and Joel Schumacher's Speed the Plow.

A graduate of Vassar College, Davis was born and raised in Tenafly, New Jersey. She currently resides in New York City.

DERMOT MULRONEY (Randall Hertzel) starred opposite Julia Roberts and Cameron Diaz in My Best Friend's Wedding. Since then he starred in Roland Joffe's comedy Goodbye Lover, co-starring Patricia Arquette and Ellen DeGeneres; in Alan Rudolph's Trixie, along with Emily Watson and Nick Nolte; and in Where the Money Is, opposite Paul Newman and Linda Fiorentino. He will star again for director Alan Rudolph in the recently completed feature Investigating Sex, shot in Berlin.

Other credits include The Trigger Effect with Elisabeth Shue; Kansas City with Jennifer Jason Leigh; Copycat opposite Holly Hunter and Sigourney Weaver; and Tom DiCillo's satirical look at the world of independent filmmaking, Living In Oblivion, opposite Steve Buscemi and Catherine Keener. Mulroney co-produced the film, which won awards at both the Sundance and Berlin Film Festivals.

Mulroney has also appeared in How to Make an American Quilt, Bastard Out of Carolina, Longtime Companion, Where the Day Takes You, Samantha, Staying Together, Silent Tongue, Bad Girls, The Thing Called Love, Point of No Return, Where the Day Takes You, Career Opportunities, Bright Angel and Young Guns.

Mulroney earned an ACE nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his work in the HBO film Long Gone. Other credits for television include ABC's Family Picture with Anjelica Huston, the TNT feature The Heart of Justice, ABC's Daddy, CBS' Unconquered and Sin of Innocence.

His band, "The Low and Sweet Orchestra," released its first album through Interscope Records.

In addition to starring in three TV series (WKRP in Cincinnati, One Day at a Time and Head of the Class), HOWARD HESSEMAN's (Larry) numerous television credits include such shows as Soap, The Rockford Files, Laverne and Shirley, Family, The Bob Newhart Show, Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, Quincy, Blansky's Beauties, Switch, Rhoda and Barretta.

Hesseman has also been seen in many motion-pictures-for-television, among them Hustling, The Life and Times of Senator Joe McCarthy, The Amazing Howard Hughes, The TVTV show, Tarantulas: The Deadly Cargo, The Comedy Company and The Ghost of Flight 401. He has guest-starred in such MOW's as CBS' all star production of Kaufman and Hart's You Can't Take It With You, One Show Makes It Murder (with Robert Mitchum and Angie Dickinson) and the police surveillance drama Best Kept Secrets (with Patty Duke and Frederic Forrest). He also starred opposite Bette Davis (in Skyward, a drama about the aspirations of the disabled), Kate Nelligan (In Our Hands, an investigation of rape and revenge), and The Shooter (a thriller starring Ally Sheedy).

Hesseman began acting in high school and college, then went on to a number of little theater productions in San Francisco. In 1965 he joined that city's famed improvisational troupe, The Committee. Often billed as "Don Sturdy," he performed in various San Francisco, Los Angeles and companies of The Committee through 1976.

Hesseman has also appeared in over twenty-five feature films.

LEN CARIOU (Ray) is a two-time Tony Award-nominee for Best Actor in the Broadway musicals Applause and A Little Night Music. He also won the Drama Desk and Tony Awards for Best Actor with his lead role in Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, co-starring Angela Lansbury.

His film work has earned him a Genie Award for Best Actor for his role in One Man. Other feature films include Thirteen Days, Executive Decision, A Little Night Music with Elizabeth Taylor, The Four Seasons, Getting In, Lady In White and Never Talk To Strangers.

He has had numerous starring roles in movies for television and is especially proud of his work as an Alzheimer's victim in There Were Times Dear for PBS, which helped raise millions of dollars for Alzheimer's research and education.

Mr. Cariou has served as the Associate Director of the Guthrie Theater where he was noted for his productions of The Crucible and Of Mice and Men. He was Artistic Director of his "home" theater, the Manitoba Theater Center for one season and is an Honorary Lifetime Member of that company. He also directed James Whitmore in an award-winning production of Death of a Salesman at Canada's Citadel Theater.

ABOUT THE FILMMAKERS

ALEXANDER PAYNE (director/writer) made his feature film debut with the critically acclaimed Citizen Ruth, which won first prize at the Munich Film Festival and for which Laura Dern won best actress at the Montreal Film Festival. He followed up with Election, a film which, in addition to enthusiastic reviews, earned him and writing partner Jim Taylor best screenplay awards from the WGA, the New York Film Critics Circle and the Independent Sprit Awards, as well as an Oscar nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay. At the Independent Spirit awards, Election also won Best Film and Payne Best Director. Reese Witherspoon garnered a Golden Globe nomination.

Originally from Omaha, Nebraska, Payne received B.A. degrees in History and Spanish Literature from Stanford University. Payne later earned an M.F.A. in filmmaking from UCLA. His thesis film, The Passion of Martin, screened at the 1991 Sundance Film Festival and at over 20 other festivals around the world and won many awards.

JIM TAYLOR (writer) hails from Bellevue, Washington. He attended Pomona College and received his M.F.A. from New York University's Tisch School of the Arts.
In addition to collaborating with Alexander Payne on Citizen Ruth and Election, Taylor wrote and directed a short film entitled Memory Lane which has shown at several festivals and on the Sundance Channel.

HARRY GITTES (producer), a producer currently based at Columbia Pictures, began his career as a photographer and advertising copywriter in New York. As a photographer, he shot such then-promising stars as Jack Nicholson, Elliott Gould, and Liza Minnelli. He also shot album covers and acts at The Bitter End in Greenwich Village, which included such performers as Woody Allen, Louise Lasser, Cass Elliot, and Bill Cosby. As a copywriter, he won more than 30 awards, including the prestigious Gold Key. His last Madison Avenue position was Creative Group Head at Wells-Rich-Green.

Gittes came to Los Angeles in 1970 to produce the TV pilot for Bill Cosby's animated series Hey, Hey, Hey, It's Fat Albert, which proved to be his full-time entrance into film and television production. He went on to work at BBS where his feature credits included production designer and co-producer of Drive He Said, directed by Jack Nicholson. As an independent producer, Gittes made such films as Goin' South, starring and directed by Jack Nicholson; Harry and Walter Go To New York, directed by Mark Rydell; Timerider, directed by William Dear; Little Nikita, directed by Richard Benjamin and starring Sidney Poitier and River Phoenix; and Breaking In, written by John Sayles and directed by Bill Forsyth, which was the closing night feature of the 1989 New York Film Festival. Movies for television include Dangerous Company, directed by Lamont Johnson and starring Beau Bridges, which Gittes executive produced. He was also involved in the development of Alex Cox's cult classic Repo Man, in which he maintains a partner interest.

Gittes was born in Brookline, Massachusetts, and attended the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. He is married to entertainment attorney Christine Cuddy, with whom he has two children. A long-time friend of Jack Nicholson's, Gittes is the namesake for one of Nicholson's most memorable characters - Chinatown's Jake Gittes.

MICHAEL BESMAN (Producer) began his entertainment career assisting director Michael Wadleigh on the horror film Wolfen and producer Aaron Russo on the Eddie Murphy comedy Trading Places. In 1983, he became a production executive at Paramount Pictures and cut his teeth working on such films as Witness, Beverly Hills Cop, Summer School, and Star Trek 4.

In 1987, Besman went to work for the Guber-Peters Entertainment Company, and supervised the blockbuster Batman. In 1989, when Guber and Peters were named co-chairmen of Sony Pictures Entertainment, Besman was appointed executive vice-president of production for TriStar Pictures. He supervised such films as Sleepless in Seattle, Single White Female, Jumanji, Wings of Courage, Devil in a Blue Dress and As Good As It Gets.

Besman started his producing career in 1997 with Jean-Jacques Annaud's Seven Years in Tibet, starring Brad Pitt. He followed up with Don Roos' critically acclaimed The Opposite of Sex, with Christina Ricci and Lisa Kudrow. The film earned two Independent Spirit Awards, for best first feature and best screenplay, and was nominated for a Writer's Guild Award. Besman re-teamed with Roos on the romantic drama Bounce, starring Gwyneth Paltrow and Ben Affleck.

Besman started his screenwriting career by selling Lightening, an adaptation of Sheri Reynolds's novel A Gracious Plenty, to Universal Pictures, which he plans to direct independently. He is currently adapting Paul Quarrington's novel The Spirit Cabinet.

Besman is partnered with Academy Award nominated screenwriter Mark Andrus (As Good As It Gets) on his next three producing projects: The Difference a Day Makes, an original screenplay, The Sweetest Fig, an adaptation of a Chris Van Allsburg (Jumanji, The Polar Express) children's book, both for Mandalay Pictures; and for Bedford Falls, Andrus will adapt the true story of outsider artist Henry Darger for director Ed Zwick (Glory, Legends of the Fall).
Besman is a UCLA Film School graduate.

BILL BADALATO (executive producer) has produced three films with Jim Abrahams -- Mafia!, Hot Shots! and Hot Shots! Part Deux as well as Alien: Resurrection, starring Sigourney Weaver and Winona Ryder; Broken Arrow starring John Travolta; Diane Keaton's Unstrung Heroes; the aerial-action film Fire Birds; Men of Honor starring Robert De Niro and Cuba Gooding, Jr.; and 1969.

Badalato has served as executive producer on many features, including Tall Tale: The Unbelievable Adventures of Pecos Bill, Benny & Joon and the smash hit Top Gun. He has also produced the telefilms Laguna Heat and HBO's Dead Solid Perfect, based on the novel by Dan Jenkins.

He has overseen production on a long list of feature films, including Nighthawks, The Man with Two Brains, Cat People, Young Doctors in Love, Continental Divide and Jaws II.

Born in Watertown, New York, Badalato studies economics at Cornell University and completed his graduate studies at New York's New School for Social Research. Starting his professional career producing commercials, Badalato's interest in a career in features began when he met director John Hancock. After working in labor relations for Screen Gems, Badalato moved into feature production, serving as co-producer for Hancock's acclaimed baseball drama, Bang the Drum Slowly starring Robert De Niro. The creative partnership surfaced again in 1987 when he produced Hancock's Weeds.

JAMES GLENNON, A.S.C (director of photography) grew up on movie sets and follows in the footsteps of his father Bert Glennon, longtime cinematographer for director John Ford.

Glennon began his career as a camera operator, working on some of the most memorable films of the '70s and '80s, including The Conversation, Breaking Away, Coming Home, True Confessions, Ordinary People, Taps, Altered States and Absence of Malice.

His apprenticeship completed, Glennon moved up to director of photography on such motion pictures as El Norte, Smooth Talk, The Flight of the Navigator, One More Saturday Night, A Time of Destiny, A Show of Force and Prisoners.

About Schmidt marks Glennon's third collaboration with director Alexander Payne, having lensed two previous features, Citizen Ruth and Election.

Glennon has also worked extensively in television, having photographed the PBS/American Playhouse special Lemon Sky, episodes of The West Wing and the CBS mini series, Blonde.

Glennon is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, a Resource person at the Sundance & American Film Institutes and on the advisory board of the Sun Valley Film Festival and the UCLA Alumni Association.

JANE ANN STEWART (production designer) reunites with filmmaker Alexander Payne after working on both Election and Citizen Ruth.

Stewart was born in Texas and raised in Connecticut and Europe. She graduated from UC Berkeley, where she majored in Art and commenced her career behind the camera as a scenic artist on Jaws and Star Trek: The Motion Picture. One of the original quartet of female set painters who gained entry into the motion picture industry in the 1970s, Stewart continued her career as art department assistant on Beetlejuice, The Lost Boys and The Accidental Tourist. Her first assignment as Production Designer was on Luca Bercovici's Rockula.

As Production Designer, Stewart worked on Allison Anders's Mi Vida Loca and Gas, Food, Lodging, as well as the films Candyman, The Maker, Inside Monkey Zetterland, Good Luck, The Invasion of Privacy and The Soul Opposite. In addition, she served as art director on Tim Burton's Ed Wood.

Stewart worked at Propaganda Films for two years, where she initially collaborated with director Payne on the cable series Inside Out. She also designed the HBO feature Breast Men, the Rock the Vote special and such short films as Johnny Depp's Every Cake, Mia Goldman's Dizziness and the AFI short Driftwood.

KEVIN TENT (editor) Tent began his quick rise at Roger Corman Films, where he edited cult classics such as Not of This Earth and Hollywood Blvd. II. His feature film credits include Ted Demme's Blow starring Johnny Depp, Girl Interrupted starring Winona Ryder and Angelina Jolie and Alexander Payne's Election for which he received an A.C.E. Eddie Award nomination. He also edited Citizen Ruth for Alexander Payne, which starred Laura Dern and premiered at the 1997 Sundance Film Festival. His other credits include Guncrazy, directed by Tamara Davis, and Since You've Been Gone, directed by David Schwimmer.

ROLFE KENT (Composer) recently wrote the scores for director James Mangold's romantic comedy Kate & Leopold starring Meg Ryan and Hugh Jackman, the critically acclaimed Nurse Betty from director Neil LaBute, and the blockbuster comedy Legally Blonde with Reese Witherspoon.

Kent previously scored director Alexander Payne's Election and Citizen Ruth. His other motion picture credits include The Theory of Flight, The House of Yes, The Slums of Beverly Hills, Town & Country and Someone Like You.

Kent composed the music for the comedy 40 Days and 40 Nights, starring Josh Hartnett and the six-part mini-series "The Jury." He has also composed for television and stage.

WENDY CHUCK's (costume designer) first feature film credit as designer, A Country Life, starring Sam Neill and Greta Scacchi, earned her an Australian Film Institute Award nomination for best costume. She has since designed costumes for Alexander Payne's critically acclaimed award-winning satire Election. She has also served as the costume designer on the box-office success Varsity Blues, as well as on Strange Hearts, Auggie Rose and Sugar and Spice. She is currently at work on Terry Zwigoff's (Ghost World) new film.

Ms. Chuck began her career working in her native Australia in theater, opera, and television. She shared her tenure at the Queensland Theater Company with Academy Award-winning actor Geoffrey Rush. She also worked on costumes for the Australian Opera Company and on many productions for ABCTV in Australia.

After working on Jane Campion's telefilm 2 Friends, she reunited with two-time Academy Award nominee Janet Patterson on Jane Campion's Portrait of a Lady and The Piano.

In addition to her work in film, theater, opera and television, Ms. Chuck
designed over 100 period costumes a year for special displays at London's Museum of the Moving Image and for the United Kingdom's Department of Trade and Industry exhibit at the 1992 World Expo in Seville.

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