Andrea Berloff

Andrea Berloff (born April 7, 1974) is an American screenwriter, actress, director,^[1] and producer. Berloff is best known for writing the screenplays for the drama films World Trade Center and Straight Outta Compton. She received an Academy Award nomination for writing Straight Outta Compton.

Early life

Andrea Berloff was born to a Jewish family^[2][3] in Framingham, Massachusetts in 1974. She attended Framingham South High School until she graduated in 1991.^[4] Upon graduating high school, Berloff attended Cornell University to study drama which she then graduated from in 1995.^[5][6]

Career

Acting

Berloff's brief acting career began shortly after she graduated from college. In 1997, she played the role of the nameless sister in the

In 2001, Berloff was cast in a minor role as a popular high school girl for the short film Eyeball Eddie, directed by Elizabeth Allen Rosenbaum. The film starred Martin Starr and depicted the story of a boy named Eddie with a prosthetic glass eye, who discovers the benefits of using his glass eye as a diversion tactic in his wrestling competitions.^[8]

In 2005, Berloff acted as the

In 2002, Berloff along with Drew Filus, co-wrote the short film Domestic, in which Filus also acted as director. The film depicted the story of a man trying to find a model who recently left him.[11]

In 2006, Berloff wrote the screenplay for the film World Trade Center, directed by Oliver Stone. The film marked her screenwriting debut for feature-length films. The film starred Nicolas Cage and Michael Peña as two policeman who were trapped in the rubble after the attacks on the World Trade Center during 9/11. The Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles reported that when writing the script, Berloff described that she did not want to create another disaster movie or epic film about American patriotism. Instead she set out to write the film as "a tribute to the survivors and the people who aided in saving them during 9/11."^[12] The idea was for her to keep the film "non-political."^[12] They also reported that Berloff conducted much research for writing the script. She interviewed many survivors from the traumatic event including the two policeman the film is based on, John McLoughlin and Will Jimeno.^[12] The film took several months to write due to her extensive amount of research along with the stress of her responsibility to convey the story properly. Before production of the film, director Oliver Stone, assured Berloff that he would remain faithful to the script she wrote.^[12] Berloff`s work on the script was seen as a success and even earned her a spot on Variety`s list of 10 screenwriters to watch.^[13] In 2006, Berloff also made her debut in playwriting with her work on Girl Scouts of America, a play depicting the activities of four girls, two of them being counselors, earning their Girl Scout badges at camp. She co-wrote the play alongside of Mona Monsieur, where they presented it at the New York International Fringe Festival.^[14]

In 2006,

In 2013, Deadline Hollywood reported that Berloff was tasked with writing the screenplay for Universal Studios’ Legend of Conan.^[17] The film will serve as a sequel to the 1982 film Conan The Barbarian but will ignore the 1984 sequel Conan The Destroyer and the 2011 reboot starring Jason Momoa.^[17] The film will see the return of Arnold Schwarzenegger, taking on the role of Conan once again after more than three decades from the initial film’s release. The film is still in development and has no set date for production or release just yet.^[17]

In 2015, Berloff co-wrote the screenplay for the biographical drama