Davis Guggenheim

Director, Producer

Davis Guggenheim was an Executive Producer on "Training Day" and has directed a feature film called "Gossip," both for Warner Bros. His television directing credits include recently completed episodes of "The Shield," "Alias," and "24" as well as such critically acclaimed programs as "NYPD Blue," "ER," and "Party of Five." He is currently a Producer and Director of the upcoming HBO dramatic series "Deadwood."

In 1999, Guggenheim undertook an ambitious project documenting the challenging first year of several novice public school teachers. The result of this intensive immersion into Los Angeles' public school system is two films. The First Year and Teach. Both films were made to address the tremendous need for qualified teachers in California and nationwide, to create awareness of the cities as well as inspire the next generation to become teachers.

In 2002, The First Year was selected among eleven thousand candidates to receive a Peabody Award, the most prestigious ward given in the field of broadcast television. In addition it received the Grand Jury Prize at the Full Frame Film Festival, the premiere documentary film festival in the United States.

Guggenheim's other documentary films include "Norton Simon: A Man and His Art," produced for permanent exhibition at the Norton Simon Museum, and "JFK and the Imprisoned Child," produced for permanent exhibition at the John F. Kennedy Library. Guggenheim wrote and edited many films with his father, four-time Academy Award winner Charles Guggenheim.

A graduate of Brown University, Guggenheim moved to Los Angeles to pursue filmmaking. He joined the independent Outlaw Production, working closely with filmmakers there, including director Steven Soderbergh on the groundbreaking 1989 film "sex lies and Videotapes," and co-producing other feature films with Outlaw.

Guggenheim now serves on the Board of Directors TEACH FOR AMERICA; a non-profit organization that recruits and trains college graduates to teach in urban and rural schools across America.