John Pierson (born April 10, 1954) is an American independent filmmaker. He is best known for helping to produce the first works by filmmakers

Spike Lee Shelton Jackson "Spike" Lee (born March 20, 1957) is an American film director, producer, screenwriter, and actor. His production company, 40 Acres and a Mule Filmworks, has produced more than 35 films since 1983. He made his directorial debut ...

, Richard Linklater, Michael Moore, and

Kevin Smith Kevin Patrick Smith (born August 2, 1970) is an American filmmaker, actor, comedian, comic book writer, author, YouTuber, and podcaster. He came to prominence with the low-budget comedy buddy film '' Clerks'' (1994), which he wrote, directed, ...

, which he wrote about in his 1995 book '' Spike, Mike, Slackers, & Dykes'' (reissued in 2004 as ''Spike, Mike Reloaded'').Glenn Kenny
"A Brief History of American Independent Film: 'Split Screen' on FilmStruck,"
''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'', January 11, 2018.

Career

After the publication of ''Spike, Mike, Slackers, & Dykes'', Pierson began producing and hosting the TV show ''

Split Screen Split screen may refer to: * Split screen (computing) Split screen is a display technique in computer graphics that consists of dividing graphics and/or text into adjacent (and possibly overlapping) parts, typically as two or four rectangular ...

'', which premiered on IFC in 1997 and had an initial run of 60 episodes containing interviews and video essays covering topics related to American indie film. Season 10 premiered on January 13, 2018, on the Criterion Channel on FilmStruck. Pierson is founder and president of Grainy Pictures, Inc., a film and television production company.

Personal life

Pierson lives in

Austin, Texas Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of Texas, as well as the seat and largest city of Travis County, with portions extending into Hays and Williamson counties. Incorporated on December 27, 1839, it is the 11th-most-populous city ...

, and teaches in the

University of Texas The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,075 ...

Radio-Television-Film department.RTF Master Class

His wife, Janet Pierson, is the chief programmer of the film section of South by Southwest.

Books

* '' Spike, Mike, Slackers, & Dykes: A Guided Tour Across a Decade of American Independent Cinema''. New York:

Miramax Books Miramax Books was an American publishing company started by Bob and Harvey Weinstein of Miramax Films to publish movie tie-ins. Between 2000 and 2005, while Jonathan Burnham was its president and editor-in-chief, the imprint published the memoirs ...

/Hyperion, 1995. * ''Spike, Mike Reloaded: A Guided Tour Across a Decade of American Independent Cinema''. New York: Miramax Books/Hyperion, 2003.

References

External links

*
John Pierson: Short Bio
1954 births Living people Film producers from Texas Writers from Austin, Texas University of Texas at Austin faculty {{US-film-bio-stub