Ted Hope

Ted Hope (born 1962) is an American independent film producer based in New York City. He began work as Executive Director of the San Francisco Film Society on September 1, 2012. Currently, he serves as Co-Head of Movies for Amazon Studios. Hope has produced the first films of such notable filmmakers as Ang Lee, Hal Hartley, Nicole Holofcener, Todd Field, Michel Gondry, Moises Kaufman, and Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini, among others. In the early 1990s, Hope co-founded with James Schamus the production/sales company Good Machine, which he and his partners sold to Universal in 2002. That same year he co-founded This is That with his current partner Anne Carey, Good Machine's Head of Business Affairs Diana Victor, and his former assistant, Anthony Bregman. Among Hope's twenty-three Sundance entries, are three Grand Jury Prize winners: American Splendor (2003), The Brothers McMullen (1995) and What Happened Was... (1994). American Splendor also won the FIPRESCI Award at the 2003 Cannes Film Festival, the Critics prize at the 2003 Deauville Film Festival, and was nominated for five Spirit Awards and one Academy Award. Hope has also produced two Sundance Opening Night selections: Nicole Holofcener's Friends with Money (2006) and Moises Kaufman's The Laramie Project (2002), which was nominated for five Emmys. Hope was instrumental in organizing the successful 2003 antitrust campaign against the MPAA and its ban on screeners, uniting a diverse constituency, strategizing the effort, and ultimately providing in court the oral testimony that helped sway the judgement. Although the MPAA head, Jack Valenti, claimed The Screen Ban was about combating "piracy", it was recognized by the court as stifling competition, particularly that of independent filmmakers against Hollywood. Hope has claimed a double win in the court case, as it is also where he met his wife filmmaker Vanessa Hope. In 2013, IndieWire named Hope to its inaugural list of Influencers, a list "dedicated