Chuck Braverman is the co-founder and managing director of the first Westdoc Conference for documentary and reality producers held in Santa Monica in September 2009. Chuck has been a senior studio executive at Sony, owned a successful production company, and has been the director of many television episodes and several MOW’s His first project after graduating from the Cinema Department at the University of Southern California, was the history of the USA in three minutes. "American Time Capsule," the fast cut montage became an instant film classic and the largest selling educational film. Braverman Productions was born and Chuck produced many commercials for major clients including Xerox, Chevrolet, Goodyear, Kodak and more. Corporate films for Apple Computers, Seagrams, Atlantic Records followed and David Bowie, Paul McCartney, Cher, Bob Seeger and many others hired Chuck to produce and direct their music videos. Chuck produced "What's Up America!" for Showtime, an hour long documentary series shot country wide and “The Big Laff Off” series featuring then unknown comics Eddie Murphy, Jerry Seinfeld and more. Network television specials with stars Willie Nelson, Andy Kaufman, and Tony Bennett followed.
Chuck produced and directed his first dramatic feature film, the New York film noir thriller "Hit and Run" based on the Lucille Fletcher book "Eighty Dollars to Stamford." Coming back to Los Angeles Chuck started directing episodic television shows including St. Elsewhere, Crazy Like a Fox, and Life Goes On. Movies of the week included stars Mark Harmon, Kirstie Alley, Keanu Reeves and Kiefer Sutherland.
By the mid 90's Chuck became Senior Vice President at Sony New Technologies supervising the development and production of Sony's new story driven dramatic 3-D Imax films. He worked with top producers, directors, and executives at Sony Pictures and Sony Pictures Classics in marketing and production. He supervised all elements of production and post production on multi-million dollar films and developed new projects. He also supervised the production of an experimental interactive feature film and was in charge of the west coast office of Sony New Technologies.
Since going back to documentaries in 1999, Chuck has been nominated three times by the Directors Guild of America and won the DGA award for best feature documentary in 2001 for “High School Boot Camp.” In 2001 Chuck was nominated for an Academy Award® for his documentary “Curtain Call” about the Actors Fund retirement home. In the last few years Chuck has produced for Discovery Channel, Animal Planet, A&E, Discovery Times, HBO, TLC, Court TV and Discovery Health. Chuck’s documentary films have made the Oscar® doc short list the last two years.
Chuck has a degree in Cinema from the University of Southern California where he has taught directing and documentary production and is a member of the Directors Guild of America, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and the International Documentary Association.
DIRECTOR/PRODUCER
Suspect Pilot ‘07 Court Tv
Abused Oscar® short list ‘05 A&E
Caught In The Moment Pilot ‘05 Animal Planet
When Planes Go Down One Hour Special Discovery Channel
Bottom of the Ninth ’03 DGA Nom Indie Documentary
High School Boot Camp ’01 DGA WINNER Discovery Channel
Children of the Court ’02 DGA Nom Discovery Channel
Curtain Call ’01 Oscar® Nom HBO/Cinemax Reel Screen
Hit and Run Feature Film Comworld Pictures
Hello, I Must Be Going - A Salute To Groucho Ha Channel Special
Richard Lewis I'm In Pain Concert Showtime Special
Boy Meets Girl HBO Special starring Billy Crystal
Willie Nelson at Lake Tahoe Showtime Special
Teddy Pendergrass Plays Tahoe One Hour Special
Tony Bennett Sings One Hour Special
Roadshow NBC Special Stars, John Candy, Tom Waits
American Time Capsule Smothers Bros (history of the USA in 3 minutes)
Two Cops Award winning documentary
The Making of Beatlemania Emmy nominee Syndicated special
The Television Newsman Emmy winning special
Breathe a Sigh of Relief Emmy winning special
Oscars' First Fifty Years For the Mot. Pic. Acad. with Jack Lemmon
(EXECUTIVE) PRODUCER
Twisted Sisters in post production MSNBC
American Pitbull DVD ‘08
A Revolving Door Oscar short list ‘06 HBO
Debutantes Special A&E
Queen For A Day Fox Synd pilot
Biography of Oscar® Two Hour special A&E
Prison Medical HD Special Discovery
Sextuplets Special Discovery Health (in production)
Season of the Grizzly Special Animal Planet (in production)
Making Marines 3 Hours Discovery Channel
Parris Island Drill Instructors Special Discovery Channel
Original Gangster Special TLC
Hollywood On Hollywood Film Montage International Design Conf in Aspen
Look Back In Anger Showtime Starring Malcom McDowall
Andy Kaufman at Carnegie Hall Special
Whats Up America Showtime series (31 hours)
The Big Laff Off Showtime series (19 shows) Eddie Murphy, Jerry Seinfeld
DTV Disney Channel (60 Shows) Ace Award
DIRECTOR
Twister Attraction (Universal City Florida)
Hercules Synd (Universal TV)
Bay Watch Synd (All American TV)
Northern Exposure CBS (Falsey/Brand/Universal)
Final Shot: The Hank Gathers Story 2 Hr MOW (Alexander & Enright/Tribune Ent.)
Melrose Place Fox (Aaron Spelling Prods.) multiple
Beverly Hills 90210 Fox (Aaron Spelling Prods) nine episodes
Gabriel’s Fire ABC (Warner Bros) episodic
Freddy’s Nightmares Synd Lorimare Telepictures
FBI: The Untold Stories ABC Pilot (The Arthur Company/U) picked up
Prince of Bel Air 2 Hr ABC MOW (L. Hill) Mark Harmon, Kirstie Alley
Brotherhood of Justice 2 Hr ABC MOW Kiefer Sutherland, Keanu Reeves
Life Goes On ABC (Warner Bros TV) multiple episodes
Freddy's Nightmares Synd (Lorimar)
The Wizard ABC 20th Century Fox
Shadow Chasers ABC Warner Bros TV
Rags to Riches NBC Len Hill Prods.
Sledge Hammer! ABC (New World) multiple episodes
New Mike Hammer CBS (Columbia TV)
St. Elsewhere NBC (MTM) multiple episodes
Crazy Like A Fox CBS (Columbia Television) multiple
Kenny Rogers' America CBS Special (Ken Kragen Prods)
Birth & Babies ABC Special (DGA Nominee/Best Director)