MICHAEL BERGMANN is a writer and director whose favorite comments about his work are “sexy, surreal and entirely original” and “unafraid to be both smart and silly.” He is a confirmed realist who believes that realism is wasted on things that can actually happen and loves to master genres in order subvert them. Michael has been privileged to direct many great actors, and his films have won prizes all in the U.S., France, Canada, and England. His films include Milk & Money, which was called “a treat to see” by The New York Times, starring Calista Flockhart (Ally McBeal, Supergirl) and featuring Academy Award and Golden Globe Award winner Olympia Dukakis (Moonstruck, Steel Magnolias), Emmy Award Winner Peter Boyle (Everybody Loves Raymond, Young Frankenstein), Margaret Colin (As the World Turns, Gossip Girl), Marin Hinkle (Two and a Half Men, Once Again), Dina Merrill (The Player, Butterfield 8) and Robert Vaughn (The Man From U.N.C.L.E., Hustle); Influence, inspired by Michael’s son who has autism, which America Magazine said “bravely explores this rough terrain, initiating the audience into the world of autism”; Trifling With Fate of which Variety said, “unafraid to be both smart and silly”, with Bridget Moynahan (Blue Bloods, Battle: Los Angeles); and Tied to a Chair, which The New Yorker called “one of the more exotic and enticing new independent films”, starring Bonnie Loren and featuring Mario Van Peebles (All My Children, Damages) and Robert Gossett (The Closer, Batman Returns). Bergmann wrote the libretto for Stefania de Kenessey’s opera based on Tom Wolfe’s bestselling novel The Bonfire of the Vanities and directed the world premiere in New York, which Financial Times called “melodically ingratiating; caustically witty”; the filmed performance is represented by House of Film. Michael’s newest work in development, the digital series Puzzled, stars James Kacey (Ace the Case, The Making of the Mob and award-winning international actress and singer Melissa Mars (From Paris with Love, Six Ways to Die).

 

As a writer Michael Bergmann has been inspired by the innovative dialogue of Harold Pinter and David Mamet, but says he does not share their concerns. “To be as angry as Pinter you have to be able to see something from a single point of view. The minute you are interested in seeing things from different points of view you are are writing a diamond or a kaleidoscope not a sharp, beautiful spear.” Bergmann prefers to explore themes and variations which he skillfully interweaves into coherent, emotionally satisfying narratives. He says he loves the Arabian Nights for the ways in which “the emotions are so real they anchor the flying carpets.” His films offer preposterous connections, fictional institutions and unresearched statistics that are completely convincing. His flair for the absurd does not, however, carry him away. He finds that “the irrational is only interesting if you can eventually understand the kind of sense it makes.”

 

In order to encourage his audiences to follow his characters’ thought processes, Bergmann directs the transitions between his actors’ lines, rather than the lines themselves, which gives the actors great creative freedom in addition to  allowing audiences to get to know the characters. He seeks to inspire performances that combine the emotional honesty of the American descendants of Stanislavsky with the joyful technical precision of British acting. “Using rehearsal to explore the full range of possible meanings in a text liberates actors to create performances that’s uniquely their own,” Bergmann explains.

 

Bergmann has used digital photography since its inception, finding ways to work both with and against the limited contrast ratio of the digital medium. Bergmann prides himself on being able to obtain exceptional image quality and subtly expressive lighting on relatively low-budget equipment. The resulting images have some of the vividness of 13th Century stained glass, a major influence on both Bergmann’s photographic style and his sense of narrative since he first visited Chartres Cathedral as a teenager.

 

In 1999, Bergmann wrote one of the first how-to books on digital filmmaking, Trifling With Fate: How to Make a Digital Video Feature Film. He has also appeared as a lecturer and panelist at independent film conferences, speaking on the latest trends in state-of-the-art technology and the cheerful absurdity of getting independent movies made. He believes that the use of the latest digital technology enhances cinematic creativity by enabling filmmakers “to do much more on budgets which restrict them much less” every year or so.

 

He has also directed many plays and worked with musicians, dancers and artists in other genres. His wife, the sculptor and poet Meredith Bergmann has been the production designer on many of his film and theater projects. In 2008 he co-wrote What Silent Love Hath Writ: A Psychoanalytic Exploration of Shakespeare’s Sonnets with his father, Martin Bergmann.