David Alan Mamet is an American playwright, filmmaker, and author.
40 Facts About David Mamet
2.
David Mamet won a Pulitzer Prize and received Tony nominations for his plays Glengarry Glen Ross and Speed-the-Plow.
3.
David Mamet's plays Race and The Penitent, respectively, opened on Broadway in 2009 and previewed off-Broadway in 2017.
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Feature films that Mamet both wrote and directed include House of Games, Homicide, The Spanish Prisoner, and his biggest commercial success, Heist.
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David Mamet himself wrote the screenplay for the 1992 adaptation of Glengarry Glen Ross, and wrote and directed the 1994 adaptation of his play Oleanna.
6.
David Mamet was the executive producer and a frequent writer for the TV show The Unit.
7.
David Mamet was born in 1947 in Chicago to Lenore June, a teacher, and Bernard Morris David Mamet, a labor attorney.
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David Mamet has said his parents were communists and described himself as a red diaper baby.
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David Mamet worked as an actor, editor for Oui magazine and as a cab-driver.
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David Mamet was educated at the progressive Francis W Parker School and at Goddard College in Plainfield, Vermont.
11.
David Mamet was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1984 for Glengarry Glen Ross, which received its first Broadway revival in the summer of 2005.
12.
In 2002, David Mamet was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame.
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In 2017, Mamet released an online class for writers entitled David Mamet teaches dramatic writing.
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In 2019 David Mamet returned to the London West End with a new play, Bitter Wheat, at the Garrick Theatre, starring John Malkovich.
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David Mamet received an Academy Award nomination one year later for the 1982 legal drama, The Verdict.
16.
David Mamet wrote the screenplays for The Untouchables, Hoffa, The Edge, Wag the Dog, Ronin, and Hannibal.
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David Mamet received a second Academy Award nomination for Wag the Dog.
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In 1987, David Mamet made his film directing debut with his screenplay House of Games, which won Best Film and Best Screenplay awards at the 1987 Venice Film Festival and the Film of the Year in 1989 from the London Film Critics' Circle Awards.
19.
When David Mamet adapted his play for the 1992 film Glengarry Glen Ross, he wrote an additional part for Alec Baldwin.
21.
David Mamet wrote an unproduced biopic script about Roscoe Arbuckle with Chris Farley intended to portray him.
22.
In 2000, David Mamet directed a film version of Catastrophe, a one-act play by Samuel Beckett featuring Harold Pinter and John Gielgud.
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David Mamet asserts that directors should focus on getting the point of a scene across, rather than simply following a protagonist, or adding visually beautiful or intriguing shots.
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David Mamet published the essay collection Writing in Restaurants in 1986, followed by the poetry collection The Hero Pony in 1990.
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David Mamet has published a series of short plays, monologues and four novels, The Village, The Old Religion, Wilson: A Consideration of the Sources, and Chicago.
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David Mamet has written several non-fiction texts, and children's stories, including True and False: Heresy and Common Sense for the Actor.
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On May 1,2010, David Mamet released a graphic novel The Trials of Roderick Spode.
28.
David Mamet wrote one episode of Hill Street Blues, "A Wasted Weekend", that aired in 1987.
29.
David Mamet is the creator, producer and frequent writer of the television series The Unit, where he wrote a well-circulated memo to the writing staff.
30.
David Mamet directed a third-season episode of The Shield with Shawn Ryan.
31.
In 2007, David Mamet directed two television commercials for Ford Motor Company.
32.
The papers of David Mamet were sold to the Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin in 2007 and first opened for research in 2009.
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In 2015, the Ransom Center secured a second major addition to David Mamet's papers, including more recent works.
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David Mamet himself has criticized his tendency to write "pretty" at the expense of sound, logical plots.
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David Mamet dedicated Glengarry Glen Ross to Harold Pinter, who was instrumental in its being first staged at the Royal National Theatre, in 1983, and whom David Mamet has acknowledged as an influence on its success, and on his other work.
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David Mamet has been married to actress and singer-songwriter Rebecca Pidgeon since 1991, and they have two children, Clara and Noah.
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In 2005, David Mamet became a contributing blogger for The Huffington Post, drawing satirical cartoons with themes including political strife in Israel.
38.
In interviews, David Mamet has highlighted his agreement with free market theorists such as Friedrich Hayek, the historian Paul Johnson, and economist Thomas Sowell, whom David Mamet called "one of our greatest minds".
39.
In 2022, David Mamet declined to explicitly label himself a Republican, but described himself as a conservative who "would like to conserve those things I grew up with: the love of family, the love of the country, love of service, love of God, love of community".
40.
David Mamet endorsed Republican Mitt Romney for president in 2012, and wrote an article for The Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles imploring fellow Jewish Americans to vote for Romney.