Jeff Bleckner
Encyclopedia
Jeff Bleckner is an American
theatre and television director
.
Born in Brooklyn, New York, Bleckner made his directorial debut off-Broadway
with The Unseen Hand/Forensic and the Navigators, an evening of one-act plays by Sam Shepard
, in 1970. He also directed three off-Broadway productions of works by David Rabe: the first two plays in his Vietnam War
trilogy, The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel
and Sticks and Bones
(both of which transferred to Broadway
), and The Orphan. Additional Broadway credits include Paul Zindel
's The Secret Affairs of Mildred Wild and Herb Gardner's The Goodbye People
.
Bleckner's television directing credits include Welcome Back, Kotter
, Bret Maverick
, The Stockard Channing
Show, Knot's Landing, Dynasty
, Trapper John, M.D.
, Lou Grant
, Remington Steele
, Hill Street Blues
, Commander in Chief
, Medium
, Hawthorne and Boston Legal
, in addition to numerous television movies. His most recent project is the pilot
for Conspiracy, a potential series for the 2007-08 season, starring Lisa Sheridan
as a Washington, D.C.
attorney
attempting to undercover the secrets of a pharmaceutical company she successfully defended.
Nominations
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
theatre and television director
Television director
A television director directs the activities involved in making a television program and is part of a television crew.-Duties:The duties of a television director vary depending on whether the production is live or recorded to video tape or video server .In both types of productions, the...
.
Born in Brooklyn, New York, Bleckner made his directorial debut off-Broadway
Off-Broadway
Off-Broadway theater is a term for a professional venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, and for a specific production of a play, musical or revue that appears in such a venue, and which adheres to related trade union and other contracts...
with The Unseen Hand/Forensic and the Navigators, an evening of one-act plays by Sam Shepard
Sam Shepard
Sam Shepard is an American playwright, actor, and television and film director. He is the author of several books of short stories, essays, and memoirs, and received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1979 for his play Buried Child...
, in 1970. He also directed three off-Broadway productions of works by David Rabe: the first two plays in his Vietnam War
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...
trilogy, The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel
The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel
The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel is a play by David Rabe.Rabe's first play in his Vietnam War trilogy that continued with Sticks and Bones and Streamers, its story is bracketed by scenes depicting the death of the emotionally stunted and mentally disturbed title character, who mindlessly grabs at...
and Sticks and Bones
Sticks and Bones
Sticks and Bones is a 1971 play by David Rabe. The black comedy focuses on David, a blind Vietnam War veteran who finds himself unable to come to terms with his actions on the battlefield and alienated from his family because they neither can accept his disability nor understand his wartime...
(both of which transferred to Broadway
Broadway theatre
Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...
), and The Orphan. Additional Broadway credits include Paul Zindel
Paul Zindel
Paul Zindel Jr. was an American playwright, author, and educator.-Early years:Zindel was born in Tottenville, Staten Island, New York to Paul Zindel,Sr., a policeman, and Beatrice Frank, a nurse; his sister, Betty Hagen, was a year and a half older than he. Paul Zindel, Sr...
's The Secret Affairs of Mildred Wild and Herb Gardner's The Goodbye People
The Goodbye People
The Goodbye People is a play by Herb Gardner.The dramedy focuses on elderly Max Silverman, who is determined to reopen the Coney Island boardwalk hot dog stand he closed twenty-two years earlier for renovation, despite the fact he's recovering from a severe heart attack and it's the middle of...
.
Bleckner's television directing credits include Welcome Back, Kotter
Welcome Back, Kotter
Welcome Back, Kotter was an American television sitcom starring Gabe Kaplan and featuring a young John Travolta.It originally aired on the ABC network from September 9, 1975 to June 8, 1979.-Premise:...
, Bret Maverick
Bret Maverick
Bret Maverick is an American Western series starring James Garner in the role that made him famous in the 1957 series Maverick: a professional poker player traveling alone year after year through the Old West from riverboat to saloon...
, The Stockard Channing
Stockard Channing
Stockard Channing is an American stage, film and television actress. She is known for her portrayal of First Lady Abbey Bartlet in the NBC television series The West Wing; for playing Betty Rizzo in the film Grease; and for her role as Ouisa Kittredge in the play Six Degrees of Separation and its...
Show, Knot's Landing, Dynasty
Dynasty (TV series)
Dynasty is an American prime time television soap opera that aired on ABC from January 12, 1981 to May 11, 1989. It was created by Richard & Esther Shapiro and produced by Aaron Spelling, and revolved around the Carringtons, a wealthy oil family living in Denver, Colorado...
, Trapper John, M.D.
Trapper John, M.D.
Trapper John, M.D. is an American television medical drama and spin-off of the film MASH, concerning a lovable surgeon who became a mentor and father figure in San Francisco, California. The show ran on CBS from September 23, 1979, to September 4, 1986....
, Lou Grant
Lou Grant (TV series)
Lou Grant is an American television drama series starring Ed Asner in the titular role as a newspaper editor. Unusual in American television, this drama series was a spinoff from a sitcom, The Mary Tyler Moore Show. Aired from 1977 to 1982, Lou Grant won 13 Emmy Awards, including "Outstanding Drama...
, Remington Steele
Remington Steele
Remington Steele is an American television series, co-created by Robert Butler and Michael Gleason. The series, starring Stephanie Zimbalist and Pierce Brosnan, was produced by MTM Enterprises and first broadcast on the NBC network from 1982 to 1987. The series blended the genres of romantic...
, Hill Street Blues
Hill Street Blues
Hill Street Blues is an American serial police drama that was first aired on NBC in 1981 and ran for 146 episodes on primetime into 1987. Chronicling the lives of the staff of a single police precinct in an unnamed American city, the show received critical acclaim and its production innovations ...
, Commander in Chief
Commander in Chief (TV series)
Commander in Chief is an American drama television series that focused on the fictional administration and family of Mackenzie Allen , the first female President of the United States, who ascends to the role from the Vice Presidency after the death of the sitting President from a sudden cerebral...
, Medium
Medium (TV series)
Medium is an American television drama series that premiered on NBC on January 3, 2005, and ended on CBS on January 21, 2011. Themed on supernatural gifts, its lead character, Allison DuBois , is a medium employed as a consultant for the Phoenix, Arizona district attorney's office...
, Hawthorne and Boston Legal
Boston Legal
Boston Legal is an American legal dramedy created by David E. Kelley, which was produced in association with 20th Century Fox Television for the ABC...
, in addition to numerous television movies. His most recent project is the pilot
Television pilot
A "television pilot" is a standalone episode of a television series that is used to sell the show to a television network. At the time of its inception, the pilot is meant to be the "testing ground" to see if a series will be possibly desired and successful and therefore a test episode of an...
for Conspiracy, a potential series for the 2007-08 season, starring Lisa Sheridan
Lisa Sheridan
Lisa Sheridan in Macon, Georgia, is an American actress who has appeared in TV series Invasion, FreakyLinks, Legacy, Las Vegas, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Diagnosis: Murder and Journeyman....
as a Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
attorney
Lawyer
A lawyer, according to Black's Law Dictionary, is "a person learned in the law; as an attorney, counsel or solicitor; a person who is practicing law." Law is the system of rules of conduct established by the sovereign government of a society to correct wrongs, maintain the stability of political...
attempting to undercover the secrets of a pharmaceutical company she successfully defended.
Awards and nominations
Awards- 1971 Drama Desk AwardDrama Desk AwardThe Drama Desk Awards, which are given annually in a number of categories, are the only major New York theater honors for which productions on Broadway, Off-Broadway, Off-Off-Broadway compete against each other in the same category...
Most Promising Director (The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel) - 1972 Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Director (Sticks and Bones)
- 1982 Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing in a Drama Series (Hill Street Blues)
- 1984 Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing in a Limited Series or a Special (Concealed Enemies)
- 1984 Directors Guild of AmericaDirectors Guild of AmericaDirectors Guild of America is an entertainment labor union which represents the interests of film and television directors in the United States motion picture industry...
Award for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in a Dramatic Series (Hill Street Blues)
Nominations
- 1972 Tony AwardTony AwardThe Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes achievement in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ceremony in New York City. The awards are given for Broadway...
for Best Direction of a Play (Sticks and Bones) - 1982 Emmy AwardEmmy AwardAn Emmy Award, often referred to simply as the Emmy, is a television production award, similar in nature to the Peabody Awards but more focused on entertainment, and is considered the television equivalent to the Academy Awards and the Grammy Awards .A majority of Emmys are presented in various...
for Outstanding Directing in a Drama Series (Hill Street Blues) - 1985 Emmy Award for Outstanding Directing in a Limited Series or a Special (Do You Remember Love)
- 1986 Directors Guild of America Award for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Dramatic Specials (Do You Remember Love)
- 1995 Emmy Award for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Directing for a Miniseries or a Special (Serving in Silence: The Margarethe Cammermeyer StoryServing in Silence: The Margarethe Cammermeyer StoryServing in Silence: The Margarethe Cammermeyer Story is a 1995 American television film on NBC.-Plot:The film recounts the events in the life of Colonel Margarethe Cammermeyer which led to her retirement from the Washington National Guard under the U.S...
) - 2000 Emmy Award for Outstanding Miniseries (The Beach Boys: An American FamilyThe Beach Boys: An American FamilyThe Beach Boys: An American Family is a 2000 television film written by Kirk Ellis and directed by Jeff Bleckner. It is a dramatization of the early years of The Beach Boys, from their formation in the early 1960s to their peak of popularity as musical innovators, through their late-60s decline ,...
) - 2001 Directors Guild of America Award for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Movies for Television (The Beach Boys: An American Family)
- 2004 Directors Guild of America Award for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Movies for Television (The Music Man)
External links
- Jeff Bleckner at the Internet off-Broadway DatabaseLortel ArchivesThe Lortel Archives, or the Internet Off-Broadway Database is an online database that catalogues theatre productions shown off-Broadway.The archives are named in honor of actress and theatrical producer Lucille Lortel.-See also:...