Bio: Jeffrey Jacob Abrams was born in New York City and raised in Los Angeles, the son of TV producer parents. At 15, he wrote the music for Don Dohler's Nightbeast (1982). In his senior year of college, he and Jill Mazursky teamed up to write a feature film, which became Taking Care of Business (1990). He went on to write and produce Regarding Henry (1991) and Forever Young (1992). He also co-wrote Gone Fishin' (1997) with Mazursky. Along with other Sarah Lawrence alumni, he experimented with computer animation and was contracted to develop pre-production animation for Shrek (2001).Abrams worked on the screenplay for Armageddon (1998) and co-created (as well as composing the opening theme of) Felicity (1998), which ran for four seasons. He founded the production company Bad Robot in 2001 with Bryan Burk. He created and executive-produced Alias (2001) and Lost (2004), composing the theme music for both, and co-writing episodes of "Lost". He also co-wrote and produced thriller Joy Ride (2001). He made his feature directing debut with Mission: Impossible III (2006), reinvigorating the series. He produced the hit mystery film Cloverfield (2008) and co-created Fringe (2008).He directed the Star Trek (2009) reboot, proving successful with fans and newcomers to the franchise. He next directed Super 8 (2011), co-produced by Steven Spielberg and produced Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2011). He returned to direct the follow-up to his reboot, Star Trek Into Darkness (2013). Disney and Lucasfilm announced J.J. as their choice for director of the first episode in the new 'Star Wars' trilogy, Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens (2015). He initially resisted, as he didn't want to travel away from his family to London, but Kathleen Kennedy convinced him that his voice would be the best to reinvigorate this franchise, as he had done with two others before. He also produced Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation (2015) and Star Trek Beyond (2016), and executive-produced Star Wars: Episode VIII - The Last Jedi (2017). When it was announced that Colin Trevorrow would no longer direct Star Wars: Episode IX - The Rise of Skywalker (2019), it was announced that J.J. would return to complete the trilogy he started.
Tivia: He says he got the job directing Mission: Impossible III (2006) after Tom Cruise watched early episodes of Alias (2001) on DVD and loved them. The two started hanging out together and Cruise offered him the job.Is the first director to have directed both a Star Trek film and a Star Wars film.His debut film Mission: Impossible III (2006) was the most expensive film ever made by a first-time director until TRON: Legacy (2010), directed by Joseph Kosinski, which cost nearly $20 million more than MI3.Is a huge fan of The Twilight Zone (1959), with his favorite episode being Walking Distance (1959).Frequently uses the name Kelvin in his movies, which was the name of his grandfather. Examples: the character Kelvin Inman from Lost (2004); the postcard addressed to H. Kelvin from Mission: Impossible III (2006); the USS Kelvin from Star Trek (2009) and Star Trek Into Darkness (2013), Kelvin Gasoline from Super 8 (2011) and a location named "Kelvin Ridge" from Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens (2015).Sold his screenplay for Forever Young (1992) for $2 million.Is the only person other than George Lucas to have directed multiple Star Wars films.Gave Alias (2001) star Jennifer Garner a pink bicycle for her birthday. She would often greet the production crew by ringing the bells on the bike's handlebars.Is an avid fan of Downton Abbey (2010) and has visited the set in Ealing Studios.Best friends with Greg Grunberg. They have known each other since they were children and he frequently casts Grunberg in his movies and television series.While he was writing scripts in college, he used the Alvin Sargent screenplay to Ordinary People (1980) as a guide.He has been involved with several projects that advance the social theory called the "Milgram Small World Phenomenon", named after social psychologist Stanley Milgram, who conducted acquaintance path experiments. John Guare's play "Six Degrees of Separation" (and its film adaptation Six Degrees of Separation (1993)) is in large part responsible for introducing to popular culture at large the notion that everyone in the world is separated by only six other people (Abrams had a small acting role in the film version). Abrams went on to produce Six Degrees (2006), a television series with a premise predicated on this theory, and Lost (2004), a television series in which seemingly unconnected and disparate characters often end up having hidden or unknown links to each other.His daughter, Gracie Abrams, is a professional singer.Ranked #29 on Entertainment Weekly magazine's The 50 Smartest People in Hollywood (2007).Attended and graduated from Sarah Lawrence College in Yonkers, New York (1988).His children, Henry Abrams and Gracie Abrams, provided the voices for his production company, Bad Robot Productions.Is one of 115 people invited to join the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) in 2007.He had discussed wanting to be more involved in the third season of Lost (2004) (intermittently with his film schedule) because he had not been directly involved in the series since the sixth episode of the first season.In 2011, during an interview on the NPR program "Fresh Air with Terry Gross", writer/director Abrams told a story about getting to attend a very early rough-cut screening of Escape from New York (1981) with his father, producer Gerald W. Abrams (who knew that his then-15-year-old son was a huge fan of John Carpenter). Abrams told Gross that during the discussion afterward, Gerald suggested cutting an opening sequence in which Snake tries to rob a bank and is caught, on the principle that Snake seems like a more imposing, mythic, tougher character if you don't see him defeated right away. Young J.J. suggested making it clearer that Adrienne Barbeau's character Maggie dies at the end. Both suggestions were followed in the final cut: the opening scene was deleted, and a shot was added showing Maggie's body.The action scenes in his movies often focus on debris flying violently through the air or space (e.g. the opening scene of Lost (2004); the scenes in Star Trek (2009) and Star Trek Into Darkness (2013) where starships are under heavy attack; and the train accident and finale of Super 8 (2011)).Has cited Steven Spielberg as his hero.Has three children with his wife, Katie McGrath: son Henry Abrams (born in 1998), daughter Gracie Abrams (born in 1999) and son August Abrams (born on January 11, 2006).Tom Cruise and Steven Spielberg asked him to write War of the Worlds (2005), but he was busy developing the pilot for Lost (2004).In 2007, Forbes magazine estimated his earnings for the year at $17 million.Named one of Fade In magazine's "100 People in Hollywood You Need to Know" (2005).Is a fan of Howard Stern, who is also a fan of of Abrams' work (particularly Lost (2004) and Star Trek (2009)) and personally called Artie Lange through his agent to congratulate him on his being hired to replace Jackie Martling ("The Joke Man") as a sidekick in 2002. Also gave Stern's daughters a tour of the set of Felicity (1998).Currently resides in Pacific Palisades, California.His favorite movies are Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope (1977), The Philadelphia Story (1940), Rear Window (1954), Tootsie (1982) and Jaws (1975).Has had the visual effects studio Industrial Light & Magic repair his overuse of lens flair, by removing them in post-production.Son of Carol Abrams (born Carol Ann Kelvin), a producer, writer, and academic, and Gerald W. Abrams, a producer.Wrote a Superman screenplay for Warner Brothers called Superman Flyby, which would have had Lex Luthor revealed to be a Kryptonian sleeper agent with powers equal to Superman and Krypton would still exist. Warner Brothers rejected his screenplay, and Superman Returns (2006) was made instead.Has provided an uncredited screenplay polish for Iron Man (2008).Was going to direct an adaptation of Stephen King's The Dark Tower series, where he would have reunited with Lost (2004) co-creator Damon Lindelof, but he dropped out after two years of development.