Biography
The partner with Tim Bevan in Working Title Films, Eric Fellner and Bevan have the distinction of having produced or executive produced three consecutive nominees for the Academy Award for best picture -- "Four Weddings and a Funeral" (1994), "Dead Man Walking" (1995), and "Fargo" (1996), and their work with directors working outside the Hollywood system both in the U.S. and their native Britain has made their company a role model in the 90s. Fellner began his career for Zoetrope, a music video production outfit in Britain, and eventually produced videos for Duran Duran, Fleetwood Mac, The Rolling Stones, Elton John, and Rod Stewart, among others. Fellner founded the Initial Pictures company with partner Scott Millaney in 1985, and they produced their first feature film, "Sid and Nancy" about the singer of the Sex Pistols, released in 1986. This was followed by the "B movie" homage, "Straight to Hell" (1987), as well as "Pascali's Island" (1988), starring Ben Kingsley. Fellner and Initial Pictures executive produced "A Kiss Before Dying" and "Year of the Gun" (both 1991) before he split with Millaney and joined Bevan in Working Title. Bevan had already split from his original partner, Sarah Radclyffe, having established himself with such projects as "My Beautiful Laundrette" (1985), and "A World Apart" (1988). Fellner and Bevan plunged the newly-vitalized Working Title into cutting-edge filmmaking, executive producing Tim Robbins' directorial debut, "Bob Roberts" (1992), then producing Vincent Ward's "Map of the Human Heart" (1993). That same year, 1993, they executive produced Mario Van Peebles' "Posse." "Four Weddings and a Funeral," which starred Hugh Grant in a look at love and commitment, followed in 1994, the same year Working Title first associated with the Coen Brothers with Fellner and Bevan and executive producers of "The Hudsucker Proxy." In 1995, they worked again with Van Peebles, and his father, Melvin Van Peebles as well, as executive producers of "Panther," and also produced "French Kiss," a comedy starring Meg Ryan and Kevin Kline, and "Moonlight and Valentino," which while focusing on women and their need for love and relationships, may someday be best recalled as the film debut of Jon Bon Jovi. Also in 1995, Working Title associated anew with Tim Robbins for "Dead Man Walking." In 1996, came The Coen Brothers' "Fargo," on which Fellner and Bevan were executive producers. They again worked with the Coens in 1997 on "The Big Lebowski." Also in 1997, came the slapstick "Bean," "The Strangest Places," and a big-screen version of "The Borrowers," based on the novels for children by Mary Norton about a tiny human family living in the cracks of a house. Working Title had previously produced "The Borrowers" in two TV versions, both seen on TNT. Their other TV work includes the acclaimed miniseries "Armistead Maupin's Tales of the City" for PBS, and Fellner produced the movie "Frankie's House" for A & E, about journalists in Vietnam (1993).
