Paula Wagner

In her early career in New York, Wagner played several ensemble parts in the 1971 stage production of Lenny [7] and her first marriage, to set designer Robin Wagner, brought her into the industry's A-list circles; she was present when director Michael Bennett shared ideas with Robin for A Chorus Line".[8]

After her work on the stage, Wagner became a talent agent at Creative Artists Agency (CAA) in Los Angeles, where she met and worked with Tom Cruise.[9] In 1993, she launched Cruise/Wagner Productions (C/W) with her former CAA client Tom Cruise. For the next 13 years, Cruise and she produced a wide range of films that earned numerous awards, widespread critical praise, and global box office success. The first film released under the C/W banner was the international hit Mission: Impossible, the success of which brought the company the 1997 Producers Guild of America's Nova Award for Most Promising Producers in Theatrical Motion Pictures.

C/W went on to produce such films as The Others, The Last Samurai, Vanilla Sky, Without Limits, Shattered Glass, Narc, Elizabethtown, and Ask the Dust, as well as Steven Spielberg's War of the Worlds (which Wagner executive produced).[3] C/W was responsible for the original Mission: Impossible film trilogy (Mission: Impossible 2 and Mission: Impossible III). In all, films produced by C/W earned more than $2.9 billion in worldwide box office receipts.[10]

Wagner continues to work as a film producer and studio executive, developing films, theatre, and television through her company Chestnut Ridge Productions.[8]

Through Chestnut Ridge Productions, her most recent film was Marshall, starring Chadwick Boseman, Josh Gad, Kate Hudson, and Sterling K. Brown; a story of a true law case early in the career of Thurgood Marshall. The movie was critically acclaimed and was nominated for one Academy Award.[11]

Her Broadway producing credits include Pretty Woman: The Musical which also opened a production in Hamburg, Germany in September 2019, a production in on the West End in February 2020; there is a US National Tour in the works. Other Broadway theatrical productions include The Heiress starring Jessica Chastain, David Strathairn, and Dan Stevens and directed by Moisés Kaufman; it opened in the fall of 2012. She also produced the Broadway premiere of Craig Wright’s acclaimed play Grace, directed by Dexter Bullard and starring Paul Rudd, Michael Shannon, Kate Arrington, and Ed Asner in October 2012 and Terrence McNally’s Tony-nominated play Mothers and Sons.[12][13][14]

In addition to her work in film and theatre, Wagner also has produced for television and numerous awards ceremonies. She was an executive producer on the critically acclaimed and award winning Lifetime original movie Five, five short films directed by five female directors. Paula produced the Governors Awards ceremony for the Motion Picture Academy in 2013 and produced both the 2011 and 2012 Producers Guild of America Award show.[15][16][17]

Wagner served on the board of the National Film Preservation Foundation through the Library of Congress and Carnegie Mellon University, where she received her degree and is an adjunct faculty member in the Master in Entertainment Industry Management program through the Heinz College.[18]

Wagner is a member of the American Cinematheque's Board of Directors [19] and the Executive Committee of the UCLA’s School of Theater, Film and Television.[20] She is also a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), the Producers Guild of America (PGA), The Broadway League and is an ambassador of ReFrame for Women In Film, a formal action plan to further gender parity in the media industry.[21]

Wagner was honored by Premiere magazine with the Women in Hollywood Icon Award in 2001.[22] In October 2006, she received the Sherry Lansing Award from the Big Brothers and Big Sisters Organization.[23] She was also honored by the Costume Designers Guild with its Swarovski President's Award in 2008.[24] She was one of the recipients of the Women in Film Crystal + Lucy Awards in 2016,[25] and the Camerimage Producer with Unique Visual Sensitivity award in 2017.[26] Her film Marshall won the Chicago “audience film festival award”.[27]

As writer