Art Linson (b. 1942 in Chicago, Illinois) is an American film producer, director and screenwriter. His directorial debut was the 1980 comedy, Where the Buffalo Roam, which was loosely based on stories by Hunter S. Thompson and starred Bill Murray as the writer. He also directed 1984's The Wild Life.
Linson has produced many films including Car Wash, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Fight Club, Melvin and Howard and the Brian De Palma films The Untouchables, Casualties of War, and The Black Dahlia. He has worked with Michael Mann, David Mamet, and Cameron Crowe.
His writing credits include the film American Hot Wax and two books, What Just Happened? Bitter Hollywood Tales from the Front Line (ISBN 1-58234-240-7), which was adapted into the film What Just Happened?, and A Pound of Flesh: Perilous Tales of How to Produce Movies in Hollywood (ISBN 0-8021-3551-X).
Born in Chicago, Linson grew up in Hollywood. He attended the University of California at Berkeley in 1960 and finished his degree at the University of California at Los Angeles. He graduated from UCLA Law School in 1967 but never practiced. In the 25 years since he produced his first motion picture, Art Linson has distinguished himself in Hollywood by developing scripts and stories that attract the highest caliber talent, resulting in some of the most admired and successful motion pictures of the last two decades. Linson's credits range from such commercial and critical hits as The Untouchables (winner of the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor Sean Connery), Heat (Robert De Niro and Al Pacino), Fast Times at Ridgemont High (Sean Penn), Car Wash and Scrooged, to unusual classics such as Melvin and Howard (winner of two Academy Awards for Best Screenplay and Best Supporting Actress, Mary Steenburgen), Fight Club (Brad Pitt and Edward Norton), The Edge (Anthony Hopkins), Heist (Gene Hackman), Casualties of War and This Boy's Life (Robert De Niro and Leonardo DiCaprio). In 1995, Linson published his first book, A Pound of Flesh: Perilous Tales of How to Produce Movies in Hollywood. His second book, What Just Happened? Bitter Hollywood Tales From the Front Line, was published in 2002.
