10th Annual Conference

LUNCHEON KEYNOTE SPEAKER:

NORA EPHRON
Film Director - Screenwriter - Writer

After becoming one of the industry's most respected screenwriters, Nora Ephron turned to directing in 1992 with her first feature, 20th Century Fox's This is My Life starring Julie Kavner. She followed it in 1993 with her second picture, TriStar's Sleepless in Seattle starring Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks, which grossed over $200 million worldwide, followed by Mixed Nuts starring Steve Martin, and then Michael, starring John Travolta, William Hurt and Andie McDowell. Her newest film You've Got Mail, starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan, was released in December 1998.

Ephron has received three Academy Award nominations for Best Original Screenplay: for Sleepless in Seattle (with David Ward and Jeff Arch), for Rob Reiner's hit comedy When Harry Met Sally, and Mike Nichols' Silkwood (co-written with Alice Arlen.). Other screenwriting credits include Heartburn (adapted from her best-selling novel of the same name), Cookie (also with Arlen), My Blue Heaven, This is my Life and Mixed Nuts (co-written with her sister Delia Ephron), and Michael (with Delia Ephron, Peter Dexter and Jim Quinlan).

Ephron started writing for movies after years as one of the country's best-known journalists. She began as a newspaper reporter for the New York Post, then became a magazine writer for Esquire, the New York Times Magazine and New York Magazine, among others. Two collections of her essays, Crazy Salad and Scribble, Scribble were bestsellers.

She lives in New York City with her husband, journalist Nicholas Pileggi, her two children, and a dog.