Biography

Paul Brickman was born on April 23, 1949 in Chicago, Illinois, USA. He is a writer and director, known for Risky Business (1983), True Crime (1999) and Uprising (2001).

His father was cartoonist Morrie Brickman, creator of "small society".

Some people like the visibility. I don't. I'm more from the J.D. Salinger school.

The success of "Risky Business" was strange because I had Hollywood coming at me full throttle. I found it very uncomfortable. I moved out of L.A. immediately. Studio heads sent me wine goblets and food baskets. And people threw material at me right and left, and lined up to meet me. It gets uncomfortable.

[on not capitalizing on the success of 'Risky Business'] I squandered a really good career. What can I say? Looking back, I could've taken advantage of "Risky'"s success to a far greater extent. I could've done more.

Tom, Rebecca De Mornay and I went out to dinner one night right before the film came out, and I told them, "Your lives are going to change radically now. I hope it's what you want." Tom was like a younger brother on the set. We were very close. I was concerned for his overall welfare because there's a certain Faustian arrangement with that kind of success. While I was happy that Tom's career took off, I was also concerned that it could affect him in some difficult ways, too, and maybe that's what happened to him. I stayed close to him for a while and as he got more successful, he became harder to reach. Unrelenting adoration can really twist you in some strange ways. It's crazy to think that one day I was sitting in a cabin thinking of these lines of dialogue, and a few years later, these young lives were profoundly changed.