Lawrence Bender

Lawrence Bender, born in New York on October 17, 1957, rose to fame as the producer of Quentin Tarantino’s films, from Reservoir Dogs (1992) and Pulp Fiction (1994) to Kill Bill Vol. 1 and Kill Bill Vol. 2 (2003-04) and Inglourious Basterds (2009). He received many Golden Globe and Oscar nominations as best producer of the above-mentioned films as well as for Gus Van Sant’s Good Will Hunting (1998). He won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival in 1994 for Pulp Fiction.

Bender started as a ballet dancer, but due to an injury, he switched to acting, then producing. He has produced and executive-produced over 100 titles in film and television, including Robert Rodriguez’s From Dusk Till Dawn (1996) written by Tarantino, Jackie Brown (1997), Anna and the King (1999), The Mexican (2001), 88 Minutes (2007), the series Dr. Vegas (2004), the miniseries Flesh and Bone (2015), and the series Rosewell, New Mexico (2019-2021).

Bender is also known for his passionate work for the environment and other social and political causes. A fervent believer in climate change action, he sits on the board of the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability at UCLA, and he’s a founding member of Global Zero, an organization aimed at the elimination of nuclear weapons.

He produced the documentary Countdown to Zero (2010) about the ominous risks posed by the proliferation of nuclear weapons, and in 2006 he produced the documentary An Inconvenient Truth, featuring former US vice president Al Gore, which started the conversation about climate change. He won an Oscar for it.  He often sits on juries at film festivals around the world, most recently at the environmentally oriented Ora! Fest in Puglia, Italy.