Neal Gabler

Neal Gabler (born 1950) is an American journalist, writer and film critic.^[1][2][3]

Neal Gabler
Gabler in 2017
Born	1950 (age 74–75)[1] Chicago, Illinois, U.S.[2]
Education	University of Michigan
Occupation(s)	Journalist, writer, broadcaster
Employer	University of Southern California[3]
Known for	Novels, journalism, political commentary, film reviews

Education

Gabler graduated from Lane Tech High School in Chicago, Illinois, class of 1967, and was inducted into the National Honor Society. He graduated summa cum laude from the University of Michigan and holds advanced degrees in both film and American culture.^[3]

Career

Gabler has contributed to numerous publications including The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, Esquire, New York Magazine, Vogue, American Heritage, The New Republic, Us, and Playboy. He has appeared on many television programs, including The Today Show, CBS Morning News, The News Hour, Entertainment Tonight, Charlie Rose, and Good Morning America. He hosted Sneak Previews for PBS, and introduced films on the cable network AMC.

He is the author of seven books: An Empire of Their Own: How the Jews Invented Hollywood (1989), Winchell: Gossip, Power and the Culture of Celebrity (1994), Life the Movie: How Entertainment Conquered Reality (1998); Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination (2006); Barbra Streisand: Redefining Beauty, Femininity, and Power (2016); Catching the Wind: Edward Kennedy and the Liberal Hour 1932–1975 (2020); and Against the Wind: Edward Kennedy and the Rise of Conservatism, 1976–2009 (2022).

In 1982, Gabler paired with Jeffrey Lyons as replacement movie reviewers for the PBS show Sneak Previews. The original hosts of Sneak Previews, Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel, had left the show for contractual reasons and Gabler and Lyons went to Chicago to produce the show. He was a writer for the Detroit Free Press at the time. Gabler left Sneak Previews in 1985 citing differences with the direction of the show. He was replaced by Michael Medved, who had had occasional appearances on Sneak Previews before replacing Gabler full-time.

In a 1988 interview, he remarked that "I'm a great believer both politically and aesthetically in pluralism. There ought to be movies for everybody. There ought to be movies for teenagers and there ought to be Police Academys – so long as they're well-made and I certainly won't begrudge anyone that – and there ought to be Tender Mercies and there ought to be Indiana Joneses."^[4]

Gabler was one of four panelists on the Fox News Channel show, Fox News Watch. On February 2, 2008, the show's host, Eric Burns, announced Gabler had left the show to work for PBS.

In 2016 Gabler attracted commentary for his cover story in The Atlantic entitled "The Shame of Middle Class Americans", in which he described the precarious debt and financial difficulties of many middle and upper class Americans, and described in some detail his own financial insecurity.^[5]

Gabler has taught at the University of Michigan and at Pennsylvania State University. As of September 2011, Gabler is a Research Fellow at the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics, and Public Policy at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government. As of 2021^[update] he is on the writing faculty at Stony Brook Southampton,^[6] and has been a Senior Fellow at the USC Annenberg Norman Lear Center.^[7] An excerpt from Life the Movie: How Entertainment Conquered Reality by Gabler was used on the AP English Language exam.^{[citation needed]}

Awards

• Outstanding Teaching Award, University of Michigan, 1978^[1]
• Los Angeles Times Book Prize for History (An Empire of Their Own), 1989
• Prix Litteraire (Best Foreign Book on Film or Television Published in French)
• National Book Critics Circle Award for Biography Finalist (Winchell), 1995
• Time Magazine Nonfiction Book of the Year (Winchell), 1995
• John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship, 2005
• USA Today Biography of the Year (Walt Disney), 2007
• Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Biography (Walt Disney) 2007
• Kraszna-Krausz Award Runner-Up
• Emmy Award, Best Short-Form Writing, 2009
• Shorenstein Fellowship, Harvard University, 2011
• Tannenbaum Lecturer, Emory University
• Patrick Henry Writing Fellowship, Washington College, 2013^[8]

Filmography

• Sneak Previews (1982–1985)
• Jack L. Warner: The Last Mogul (1993)
• Walter Winchell: Gossip, Power and the Culture of Celebrity (1995)
• Off the Menu: The Last Days of Chasen's (1997)
• Hollywoodism: Jews, Movies and the American Dream (1998)
• Warner Bros. 75th Anniversary: No Guts, No Glory (1998)
• Earl Cunningham: The Dragon of Saint George Street (2004) WMFE-Orlando Documentary
• Imaginary Witness: Hollywood and the Holocaust (2004)
• Ring of Fire: The Emile Griffith Story (2005)

Books

• An Empire of Their Own: How the Jews Invented Hollywood. Crown, 1988
• Winchell: Gossip, Power and the Culture of Celebrity. Knopf, 1994
• Life: the Movie – How Entertainment Conquered Reality. Knopf, 1998
• Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination. Knopf, 2006
• Barbra Streisand: Redefining Beauty, Femininity, and Power. Yale University Press, 2016^[9]
• Catching the Wind: Edward Kennedy and the Liberal Hour 1932–1975. Crown, 2020^[3]
• Against the Wind: Edward Kennedy and the Rise of Conservatism, 1976–2009. Crown, 2022