Tom Greene

TOM GREENE has been involved in "showbiz" literally his entire life. Born and raised in Los Angeles, California, he started at the age of five as a child actor, traveling around the country in road show musicals. He also appeared on television, films, and in commercials. He quickly turned to music and was doing piano recitals by the age of ten, and singing light opera by his early teens. At the same time he became a professional trumpet player, working in everything from professional marching bands to small classical orchestras, and has the dubious distinction of celebrating his sixteenth birthday playing at one of the top casinos in Las Vegas, Nevada (he lied about his age). At around this same time, Tom became interested in "behind the camera", and wrote and directed a series of short films that garnered over a dozen international awards. One of these shorts was purchased by Universal Studios when Tom was seventeen years old. By the time he received a writer's contract at Universal Studios at nineteen years old, he had already been a Director of Photography on two independent features; a film editor on a series of action-adventure movies; had written original music for stage; and had developed special optical effects for a series of science fiction movies, and safe fire and explosion effects for stage productions and rock concerts.) In the ensuing years, Tom has worked at all the major Hollywood studios, having written over one hundred scripts for feature films, series, movies-of-the-week and pilots. Many of the television series he worked on became the launching pad for some of the top careers in Hollywood, among them: THE LAW (Judd Hirsch's first series), MAN FROM ATLANTIS (Patrick Duffy's first series), and DOG AND CAT (Kim Bassinger's first series). Some of the other shows Tom has written include: THE SIX MILLION DOLLAR MAN, and THE BIONIC BOY (which he created). After making his mark as one of the "hottest" writers in town, Tom has gone on to become one of the top producers in Hollywood, having produced and written such hit series as MAGNUM P.I., TALES OF THE GOLD MONKEY, and KNIGHTRIDER. Tom was the Creator and Executive Producer of the ABC/WALT DISNEY STUDIOS Mini-Series WILDSIDE, (starring Meg Ryan and Howard Rollins), which was the first western series to be on television in over a decade. WILDSIDE was actress Meg Ryan's first prime time television series, and after Tom cast her in the role of Cally Oaks, she went on to tremendous success in motion pictures. After WILDSIDE, Tom went to Paramount Pictures where he wrote the highly innovative screenplay, THE NEWCOMER. He followed that by writing the Orion project REMO WILLIAMS. From there, Tom began a two year term deal with Lorimar Telepictures. While there, he sold and created the pilots to such projects as RUNAMUK, for ABC, an hour long "GOD'S MUST BE CRAZY" adventure; BOOMERANG, for CBS, about an Australian Aborigine Detective who comes to Chicago to solve a murder; HOOFBEAT, for ABC, a slightly-in-the-future "ROBOCOP" adventure series about a city-run high-tech horse patrol; THE DANGER TEAM, for ABC, which was a highly-innovative concept combining live-action with clay animation. He also created a graphic novel for DC Comics, Nth DEGREE, which was designed specifically to be adapted into a television series. Tom was Executive Producer on the MCA Entertainment hit series SWAMP THING and then became Supervising Producer on the BSB Productions/Rysher Entertainment action-adventure series THUNDER IN PARADISE starring Terry "Hulk" Hogan. Besides producing the series, Tom also wrote many of the episodes, including two spin-off motion pictures, and also wrote the first interactive CDI game based on a television series. He also directed several episodes, one of which, DEAD RECKONING garnering two director awards from both the "Art of Television" festival in Seattle, Washington, along with the first ever Mari Award granted to an American TV show, the coveted Jury Prize for Best of Show from the Glasgow, Scotland Television Festival of the Arts. In recent months, Tom has just completed co-writing a half-hour situation comedy SECOND NATURE for John O'Hurley, the extremely popular actor who portrays Mr. Peterman on the smash-hit series Seinfeld. The innovated series has already been featured in People Magazine. He also completed the high-charged action thriller, called NECESSARY EVIL, which is inspired by actual events, about a reluctant hero who discovers the secret behind a recurrent, hellacious Presence, and has only five days to save a shockingly complacent town from being blasted off the face of the Earth. He is also currently on work on LITTLE VICTORIES, an autobiographical feature about his experiences living with twenty-four hour FBI surveillance when he was a child (his father was blacklisted writer), which he will also direct. More recently, Tom has acquired the world-wide rights to the legendary song GHOST RIDERS IN THE SKY (the first producer to successfully negotiated such rights, since the song was published almost fifty years ago), and is actively developing it as a hour-action television series. Tom is also an accomplished film director, and besides his television and film work, he has received numerous directing awards for his international commercials and rock videos. He specializes in complicated action work, and has been hired on many productions to take over the action sequences, especially when fire, explosions, car chases, large scale battle sequences, or horse work is involved. He has also garnered awards for his original musical compositions, including three ballet scores for the Harkness Ballet Company, and for his directing of Opera, most notably of Mozart's "COSI FAN TUTTE" (which he also sang in), and is sought after for his voice-over work, especially his cowboy-twang characters. His voice is familiar to many Texans as the voice of the Don't Mess With Texas campaign, as well as for products in Italy, and for a weekly commentary for Sugie, an extremely popular Japanese magazine. Besides his commentary, Tom writes a column syndicated throughout Japan. Tom is an ardent "outdoorsman", whose interests go far beyond Hollywood. His interest in the West goes back to his father who was a novelist, and recipient of the Western Heritage Hall of Fame Award for Best Novel of the Year. Tom was raised on a tiny ranch in the San Fernando Valley area of Los Angeles, and had his own horse since the age of three. Tom lives in Los Angeles now, but is actively involved in saving horses from illegal slaughter houses, and rescuing wild Mustangs. He has saved, raised, and found homes for literally hundreds of horses in the past several years, and has twelve horses of his own (most saved from the slaughter houses). He boards several in Los Angeles, and keeps the rest on his ranch in Amarillo. He is also a member of the PRCA (Professional Rodeo-Cowboy Association) and competes throughout California and the Southwest in the Rodeo events Bulldogging, Team Penning and Team Roping and is a charter member of the LA Equestrian Center Team Penning Association. For the last five years Tom team-roped in Charity Rodeos with actor-cowboy legend Ben Johnson. He also is an accomplished "Jouster", and rides in Armored Jousting Tournaments at the Renaissance Pleasure Faire and most notably for charity events like the Celebrity Tournament of Horses, working with the Walking Tall Center, the Valley View Vaulters, and Ahead With Horses. He also is accomplished in the ancient equestrian skills of Keyhole, Serpentine and Quintain. Besides his home in Los Angeles, Tom also has a ranch in Amarillo where he raises horses and cattle. Recently he began to write Cowboy Poetry after meeting his idol and inspiration, Buck Ramsey who lives on a nearby ranch. Tom has performed his Cowboy Poetry and Storytelling at many symposium's throughout the country. He is also an honored member of the Texas Cowboy Poet's Association. Just recently Tom had the honor of being invited to perform for the seventh consecutive year at the National Cowboy Symposium and Celebration in Lubbock, Texas. He has also been invited back to perform for the fourth straight year at the New Orleans American Writer's Conference, at among others, the National Day In The Country Celebration in Norco, and at Cowboy Celebrations in Elko, Nevada; Riadosa, New Mexico; and Durango, Colorado. Tom also co-wrote the best selling book, OFF THE BOSS: A SURVIVAL MANUAL, which teaches employees and bosses how to cope with the stress of the modern warfare of office politics. The book has spawn an award-winning website (WWW.OFFTHEBOSS.COM), which has achieve over half a million hits since its inception in late 1998. The book is now being developed as a TV series in which employees with compete for the right to tell off their boss on nation wide television without getting fired! Tom is also one of the charter celebrity participants in the infamous "Missouri Invitational Celebrity Outdoor Celebration" held in Warsaw, Missouri. Because of the work that Tom has done for the town of Warsaw, he was recently made an active deputy sheriff of Benton County (which patrols the towns of Warsaw, Peculiar, Tightwad and Lincoln Missouri) and works with the sheriff's department whenever he's there, and last year was honored with a lifetime achievement award by the people of Missouri. Tom is also a champion trap shooter, and a member of the Amateur Trap Association of America. He is a member of the Celebrity Shooters which demonstrate their skills at many charity events such as the Robert Stack's Paralyzed Veterans Invitational Shoot; The American Outdoorsmen Invitational; Irlene Mandrel Invitational, and the Dub Taylor Memorial Celebrity Sporting Clays Shoot. During his travels, Tom is actively involved in a strong anti-drug crusade, and volunteers his time at local elementary schools, junior highs, and high schools throughout the country (especially in the mid-west), lecturing, and setting up workshops and seminars. Tom has created a highly unorthodox platform for getting his message across, which even the most conservative of school systems have accepted with open arms, because of the results. Having never taken drugs himself, yet having seen the tragic and sometimes fatal results of drugs on many of his friends, Tom is able to reach the kids with a special message from someone who was able to say "no" all his life, yet is intimately involved in the horrors they cause. He keeps a constant correspondences with numerous students with drug and alcohol related problems and is proud of having enjoyed an enormous success rate. He has also developed a pioneering literacy. In the program, students are invited to many schools throughout the country to work with inner-city students, many of whom have never written a story or read a book. He uses his own TV scripts, especially his animation projects as the basis for getting them to write scripts, and then actually directs many of these scripts with professional crews and actors who also volunteer their time, so that these students can actually see their words come to life on the screen. He is in the process of writing a book about his experiences working with these kids, along with a "how to" book, teaching parents how to "watch television" with their children, turning an once inactive medium into an active one. Show less «