Biography

Independent writer/director Kevin S. Tenney was born in 1955 in Honolulu, Hawaii. He hails from a military family and grew up in Hawaii, Bermuda and California. Tenney made his first 8mm movie while in the sixth grade. He attended the University of Southern California. He's the first and only USC film student to direct both a graduate film and a senior project, the latter of which won an Emmy Award for Best Student Production of the Year. Tenney's pictures are distinguished by strong acting, stylish cinematography and unusually well-drawn characters. Tenney made an excellent and impressive debut as both writer and director with the enduring horror cult hit "Witchboard." Tenney's follow-up films have been a nicely diverse and entertaining bunch: the immensely fun and over-the-top gory winner "Night of the Demons," the cruddy monster offering "The Cellar," the amusingly bad "Witchtrap," and the exciting sci-fi/action item "Peacemaker," plus the above average sequels "Wichboard 2: The Devil's Doorway" and "The Second Arrival."
- IMDb mini biography by: woodyanders

After moving to Los Angeles, Kevin Tenney was accepted to the Cinema/Television Department of the University of Southern California, where only the top five percent of students are given the opportunity to direct either a senior project or a graduate film. Kevin was (and still is) the only student in the University's history to direct one of each.

His senior project won an Emmy Award for the Best Student Production of The Year, and his graduate film landed him an agent at ICM and a three-picture deal with producer, Ivan Reitman (Ghostbusters, Twins, Stripes) while he was still a student at U.S.C. He then left the university early for his professional directorial debut, "Witchboard". It was made for less than one million dollars and grossed over eight million at the box office, where it opened as the fifth highest grossing film of the week on 1,100 screens. It went on to sell nearly 100,000 video cassettes and then premiered on HBO as their highest rated show of the week, beating out bigger, studio-produced films and HBO's own original programming.

Kevin has since written, directed, and/or produced more than a dozen independent films. Four of his films went on to become the top grossing films of all time for their individual distributors. Two of these four films were produced by his first production company, Mentone Pictures. Kevin's new company, Prodigy Entertainment, has already produced two films, "Brain Dead" and a big-budget re-make of "Night Of The Demons".
- IMDb mini biography by: Prodigy Entertainment

Tenney's movie Witchtrap was partially filmed in Fairfield, California, where he and his family moved after his father retired from the U.S. Air Force. Before that, his family had been stationed in Hawaii, Bermuda, and various areas of Northern California. He attended three separate grade schools, two separate middle schools, and two separate high schools before moving to Los Angeles to attend U.S.C. film school. Tenney's father was stationed in Saigon, Viet Nam during the Tet Offensive.

Made his first Super 8mm film while only in the sixth grade.

Attended University of Southern California film school.

I think the answer could work for any genre: a good story. Bottom line. Your audience will forgive everything else. They will forgive you if the acting isn't up to par or if the lighting isn't up to snuff. But the worse your story is, the more perfect everything else has to be to make up for it.

People say, 'What would you like to get into?' I'd like to do something in every genre. I don't actually want to get out of horror. I would like to do other genres, too, because for me a good film is a good film and category is secondary. I'd like to do horror films for as long as I feel I can do good horror films.