James W. Skotchdopole

James W. Skotchdopole is an Academy Award-winning and Emmy nominated American film producer. Skotchdopole won a 2015 Best Picture Academy Award for his work producing Alejandro González Iñárritu's highly acclaimed Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance). Skotchdopole's work on the film also resulted in an Independent Spirit Best Picture Award, a DGA Award, a PGA Award and a BAFTA Best Film Award nomination.

He again collaborated with Iñárritu and produced the 2016 multiple Oscar and Bafta-winning feature The Revenant, which earned Iñárritu an Oscar for Best Director and earned Leonardo DiCaprio a long-awaited Oscar's Best Actor Award.

Currently, Skotchdopole is co-executive producing Kilter Films / Amazon's new series called The Peripheral, from the William Gibson novel of the same name. Prior to that, Skotchdopole co-executive produced as well as received an Emmy Award nomination for the limited series Mrs. America starring Cate Blanchett for FX Networks. As an executive producer, he also prepared the motion picture franchise Call of Duty for Activision. Prior to that, he executive produced War Machine, starring Brad Pitt for Netflix.

A native New Yorker, Skotchdopole has been making films for some 39 years. He has worked on over 50 feature films in 17 different countries, earning executive producer credits on Quentin Tarantino's Django Unchained and Death Proof, and David O. Russell's Accidental Love.

Skotchdopole also executive produced four films for director Tony Scott: Man on Fire, Enemy of the State, The Fan, and Spy Game. Skotchdopole first worked with Scott in 1988 on Revenge, and later Days of Thunder, The Last Boy Scout, True Romance, and Crimson Tide.

Skotchdopole enjoyed a long collaboration with journalist, filmmaker and three-time Academy Award-nominated screenwriter Nora Ephron, having worked many times as her executive producer and as an associate producer on the box-office hit Sleepless in Seattle.

He cut his teeth in the industry by working with legendary directors Sir Richard Attenborough, Francis Ford Coppola, Brian De Palma, Richard Donner, John Frankenheimer, Paul Mazursky, Mike Nichols, Frank Oz, and John Schlesinger.

In 1984, Skotchdopole was the youngest member to be accepted into the Directors Guild of America. He is also a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the Producers Guild of America.

Among his many credits, Skotchdopole has produced commercials for directors Sam Mendes, Oliver Stone and Samuel Bayer.

The surname "Skotchdopole" has Czech origin, and it means "Jump into field".

Filmography

He was a producer in all films unless otherwise noted.

Film

Year	Film	Credit
1990	Naked Tango	Associate producer
1993	Sleepless in Seattle	Associate producer
	True Romance	Co-producer
1994	Mixed Nuts	Executive producer
1995	Crimson Tide	Associate producer
1996	The Fan	Executive producer
1998	Enemy of the State	Executive producer
2000	Company Man
	Sand
2001	Spy Game	Executive producer
2004	Man on Fire	Executive producer
2005	Bewitched	Executive producer
2007	Grindhouse	Line producer
	Death Proof	Line producer
2008	The Women	Executive producer
	Surfer, Dude	Executive producer
2010	My Own Love Song	Executive producer
2011	Violet & Daisy	Executive producer
2012	Lay the Favorite	Executive producer
	Upside Down	Executive producer
	Django Unchained	Executive producer
2014	Birdman
2015	Accidental Love	Executive producer
	The Revenant
2017	War Machine	Executive producer
2018	Furlough	Executive producer
2021	Crisis	Co-executive producer
TBA	The Joy Division

Second unit director or assistant director

Year	Film	Role	Notes
1985	Turk 182	Second assistant director
	A Chorus Line
1986	The Money Pit
	Brighton Beach Memoirs
1987	Mannequin
	Ishtar
	The Untouchables
	The Believers	Second assistant director: New York
1988	Biloxi Blues	Second assistant director
	Moon over Parador
	Scrooged
1989	Dead Bang
1990	Revenge
	Days of Thunder	First assistant director
1991	What About Bob?
	The Last Boy Scout
1992	Housesitter
1993	Sleepless in Seattle
	True Romance
1994	Mixed Nuts	First assistant director Second unit director	Uncredited
1995	Crimson Tide	First assistant director
1996	The Fan
1998	Enemy of the State	Second unit director	Uncredited
2000	Sand	Second assistant director
2001	Spy Game	Second unit director	Uncredited
2005	Bewitched
2008	The Women

Production manager

Year	Film	Role
2001	Spy Game	Unit production manager: Morocco
2012	Lay the Favorite	Unit production manager
	Django Unchained
2014	Birdman
2015	The Revenant

Miscellaneous crew

Year	Film	Role
1983	Easy Money	Production assistant
	Eddie and the Cruisers
	A Night in Heaven
	Slayground
1984	The Lonely Guy
	Firstborn
	The Cotton Club
2010	Just Wright	Production consultant

Thanks

Year	Film	Role
2013	The Spectacular Now	The producers wish to thank
2016	The Comedian	The producers wish to thank the following for their assistance

Television

Year	Title	Credit
2020	Mrs. America	Co-executive producer
2022	The Peripheral	Co-executive producer

Production manager

Year	Title	Role
2020	Mrs. America	Unit production manager

Miscellaneous crew

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1984	A Doctor's Story	Production assistant	Television film

External links

• James W. Skotchdopole at IMDb
• Strauss, Jordan (February 23, 2015). "James W. Skotchdopole, Sean Penn, Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, John Lesher". havasunews.com. Retrieved February 23, 2015.</ref>