| Teddy Zee | |
|---|---|
| Occupation | Producer |
| Website | |
| http://www.teddyzee.com/ | |
Teddy Zee is a longtime producer and entertainment executive in Hollywood. Perhaps the most visible and vocal champion of Asians in Hollywood, Zee has over twenty years of experience as President of Overbrook Films and Davis Entertainment, as a studio executive for Columbia Pictures and Paramount Pictures, and as an independent producer. Most recently, he has focused on doing co-productions that bridge Hollywood with China and Asia.
Zee is producing Quantum Quest: A Cassini Space Odyssey, a computer animated, 3D, large format movie that Zee is producing for Taiwan’s Digimax. The film is being made in cooperation with NASA and Jet Propulsion Lab (JPL). Zee was also the Executive Producer of The Pursuit of Happyness, a Columbia Pictures film starring Will Smith. The film has earned $300 million in worldwide ticket sales. Zee produced West 32nd, a CJ Entertainment film starring John Cho, Grace Park and Jeong Jun-Ho. It was one of 18 films selected for World Narrative Competition at the 2007 Tribeca Film Festival.
In 2005, Zee produced Hitch, a Columbia Pictures release starring Will Smith, Eva Mendes and Kevin James that earned over $365 million in worldwide ticket sales. He also produced Saving Face starring Joan Chen, official selections of the Sundance and Toronto Film Festivals. It won the 2005 Golden Horse Audience Award, Taiwan's Oscar equivalent. Previously, as President of Davis Entertainment, Zee was the Executive Producer of Life or Something Like It, a New Regency release starring Angelina Jolie.
Zee is the Executive Producer of the annual Asian Excellence Awards broadcast on E! and AZN-TV to 100 million homes in the US. He also was the Executive Producer of the talk show DIM SUM WITH TEDDY ZEE and IVY DREAMS, a documentary that follows four Asian-American high school seniors pursuing Ivy League college admissions. Both were for AZN-TV.
As Executive Vice President of Production at Columbia Pictures, Zee oversaw such films as Charlie's Angels, The Replacement Killers, Anaconda, Fools Rush In, The Devil's Own, The Cable Guy, First Knight, My Girl, Mo' Money, Hero, and Sleepwalkers. He championed Chow Yun Fat’s Hollywood debut. His project Charlie's Angels was a feature film springboard for Lucy Liu. He worked with Hong Kong filmmakers John Woo, Stephen Chow and Ringo Lam. As Senior VP of Productions at Paramount Pictures, he shepherded such films as Indecent Proposal, Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country, Cousins and The Presidio. Zee continues to work with new and established talent producing scripts that that are national and international box office hits.
Zee has an M.B.A. from Harvard University and a B.S. from Cornell University. He is a long time member of AMPAS (the Executive branch of the Academy Awards), a former member of the Executive Board of the Asian American Policy Review at Harvard's JFK School of Government, a board member of Coalition for Asian Pacifics in Entertainment (CAPE), a member of the Producers Guild of America and a trustee of the Marc Goodman Foundation for Cancer Research.
The Asian Professional Exchange (APEX) honored Zee with the 2007 Award for Excellence in the Arts and Entertainment and KCET, PBS’ Los Angeles affiliate named him “Local Hero” in 2005 for his contributions to the Asian American community. Goldsea, the Asian American Supersite, recognized his efforts in creating positive film roles for Asian actors in Hollywood by placing him No. 54 on "The 120 Most Inspiring Asian Americans of All Time".[1]
In 2010, under the Teddy Zee Productions banner, Zee produced a series of charity PSA videos alongside Don Le, George Wang, Adrian Zaw, and APEX founder Stephen Liu.[2] He executive produced the 20+ clips that featured Asian American celebrities like John Cho, Sandra Oh, Kaba Modern Legacy, Justin Chon, David Choi, and 100+ talents in a campaign to win $1 million for the Center for the Pacific Asian Family (CPAF).[3][4] The charity ended up in the top 20 out of 100 charities competing for the top prize, and ended up creating awareness for the widespread but generally unspoken issues of sexual assault and domestic violence.[5] | [6] | [7] | [8] In September 2010, he also served as Executive Producer for the video coverage on the first ever AAPI Rock the Vote 2010 campaign with doctor Paul Song, Roy Choi, George Wang, Don Le, and Adrian Zaw.[9]