Barbara Kopple

Barbara Kopple (born July 30, 1946) is an American film director, primarily known for her work in documentary film. She has won two Academy Awards, the first in 1976 for Harlan County, USA, about a Kentucky miners' strike, and the second in 1991 for American Dream, the story of the Hormel Foods strike in Austin, Minnesota in 1985-6. She grew up in Scarsdale, New York, the daughter of a textile executive. She studied psychology at Northeastern Uni... more

Barbara Kopple (born July 30, 1946) is an American film director, primarily known for her work in documentary film. She has won two Academy Awards, the first in 1976 for Harlan County, USA, about a Kentucky miners' strike, and the second in 1991 for American Dream, the story of the Hormel Foods strike in Austin, Minnesota in 1985-6. She grew up in Scarsdale, New York, the daughter of a textile executive. She studied psychology at Northeastern University, after which she worked with the Maysles Brothers. She has directed episodes of the television drama series Homicide: Life on the Street and Oz. Kopple also directed A Conversation With Gregory Peck and Bearing Witness, as well as documentaries on Mike Tyson and Woody Allen. The latter film, Wild Man Blues, focuses on his Dixieland jazz tour and on Allen's relationship with Soon-Yi Previn. Her first non-documentary feature film, Havoc, starred Anne Hathaway and Bijou Phillips as wealthy suburbanites who venture into East Los Angeles... less