| Alex Epstein | |
| Birth Date: | 26 January 1963 |
| Birth Place: | New York City, New York |
| Nationality: | American |
| Citizenship: | American, Canadian |
| Alma Mater: | Yale University UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television |
| Notable Works: | Bon Cop, Bad Cop We Happy Few |
| Spouse: | Lisa Hunter Epstein |
| Awards: | Canadian Comedy Award |
Alex Epstein (born January 26, 1963) is a dual citizen American Canadian writer, film producer, director, and educator.
Alex Epstein began his writing career as an author of short stories for literary magazines. In Hollywood, he worked as a development executive for independent films, including with his own and Angelique Gulermovich Epstein's company Muse of Fire, and as a vice-president of Blue Rider Pictures.[1] His first film writing credit was for 1994's Warriors.
In Montreal, he co-created and co-wrote the comedy television series Naked Josh and co-wrote the buddy cop crime film Bon Cop, Bad Cop.[2] He was head writer (executive story editor) for the second half of the sci-fi series Charlie Jade with writer credit on three episodes.[3] [4] He has also written and directed several short films,[5] [6] [7] and wrote young adult historical fantasy novel The Circle Cast: The Lost Years of Morgan le Fay.[8]
Epstein has worked in the video game industry as the story and voice director of Contrast by Compulsion Games.[9] For Spearhead Games' , he was brought in to assist with the branching storylines and to add humor.[10] He returned to work for Compulsion Games as the narrative director of We Happy Few.[11]
He was part of the writing team along with Patrick Huard, Leila Bason and Kevin Tierney that was nominated for the Prix Iris (Best Screenplay)[13] and won the Canadian Comedy Award (Best Writing) for Bon Cop, Bad Cop in 2007.[14] Naked Josh which he co-wrote with Laura Kosterski and the short film Role Play which he co-wrote with Lisa Hunter, have been nominated for the WGC Screenwriting Awards in 2005, 2006, and 2014.[15] The Circle Cast was shortlisted for the Quebec Writers' Federation Awards (QWF Prize for Children's and Young Adult Literature) in 2011.[16]
In addition, Epstein is also a screenwriting teacher. Crafty Screenwriting: Writing Movies That Get Made, published in 2002, is a screenwriting manual for feature films, derived from his career in development. In 2006, he wrote Crafty TV Writing: Thinking Inside the Box, focusing on his experiences in television and guiding writers in creating series and pilots. He also has a tie-in blog, "Complications Ensue".[17] [18]
Raised in New York, Epstein graduated from the Yale in 1985 in Computer Science and English and has lived in France for a year. Afterwards he graduated from the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television and has worked in Los Angeles for a decade, before eventually moving to Montreal, Canada.[19]