Paula Wagner

{{Infobox person

| name = Paula Wagner

| image = Paula Wagner Deauville 2012.jpg

| caption = Wagner in 2012

| birth_name = Paula Sue Kauffman

| birth_date = {{birth date and age|1946|12|12}}

| birth_place = Youngstown, Ohio, U.S.

| education = Carnegie Mellon University (BFA)

| occupation = Film producer

| spouse = Robin Wagner (divorced)
{{marriage|Rick Nicita|1984}}

| children = 2

}}

Paula Kauffman Wagner (born Paula Sue Kauffman) is an American film producer and film executive.{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/film/2007/nov/11/2 |title=Meet the First Lady of Hollywood |publisher=Guardian |date=11 November 2007 |access-date=13 December 2019}} Her most recent credits include the film Marshall starring Chadwick Boseman, Kate Hudson, Sterling K. Brown, and Josh Gad as well as the Broadway, West End, and US Tour productions of Pretty Woman: The Musical.{{cite web |last1=Agard |first1=Chancellor |title=Marshall: Why Chadwick Boseman decided to play another historical figure |url=https://ew.com/movies/2017/08/15/marshall-chadwick-boseman-interview/ |website=ew.com |access-date=18 July 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170815233009/https://ew.com/movies/2017/08/15/marshall-chadwick-boseman-interview/ |archive-date=15 August 2017 |date=15 August 2017}}{{cite news |last1=Wagner |first1=Paula |title=Producer Paula Wagner on Theater's Magic, Bringing 'Pretty Woman' to Broadway |url=https://variety.com/2019/legit/features/producer-paula-wagner-pretty-woman-broadway-1203223052/ |access-date=18 July 2022 |issn=0042-2738 | oclc=810134503 |work=Variety |issue=71 |publisher=Penske Business Media |date=22 May 2019 |id={{ProQuest|2237780764}} |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190522204716/https://variety.com/2019/legit/features/producer-paula-wagner-pretty-woman-broadway-1203223052/ |archive-date=22 May 2019 |volume=344}}{{cite web|url=https://www.ibdb.com/broadway-cast-staff/paula-wagner-487300|title=Paula Wagner - Broadway Cast & Staff {{!}} IBDB|last=league|first=The Broadway|website=www.ibdb.com}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0906048/|title=Paula Wagner|website=IMDb}}

Early life

Wagner was born Paula Sue Kauffman in Youngstown, Ohio. Her mother, Sue Anna (née Shofstall), was a news magazine editor from Oklahoma, and her father, Edmund Jamison "Ned" Kauffman, Jr., was a business owner.{{cite web |url=http://www.vindy.com/news/tributes/2011/jul/03/edmund-jamison-ned-kauffma/ |title=Youngstown News, Obituaries, Tributes, EDMUND JAMISON 'NED' KAUFFMAN, Youngstown, Ohio |website=www.vindy.com |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110823010920/http://www.vindy.com/news/tributes/2011/jul/03/edmund-jamison-ned-kauffma/ |archive-date=2011-08-23}} While in Youngstown, Wagner frequently performed at the local playhouse. She received her BFA from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where she currently sits on the board of trustees.{{Cite web|url=https://www.heinz.cmu.edu/faculty-research/profiles/wagner-paula|title = Paula Wagner}}

Career

=Early career=

In her early career in New York, Wagner played several ensemble parts in the 1971 stage production of Lenny.{{Cite web|url=https://www.ibdb.com/broadway-production/lenny-3608#Replacements|title = Lenny – Broadway Play – Original | IBDB}} Some of her additional credits include the role of Helena in A Midsummer Night's Dream at Yale Repertory Theatre{{Cite web|url=https://www.abouttheartists.com/productions/102447-a-midsummer-nights-dream-at-yale-repertory-theatre-1975-1|title=A Midsummer Night's Dream at Yale Repertory Theatre 1975}} as well as Maggie in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof at the Cleveland Play House. 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".

=Agent and film producer=

After her work on the stage, Wagner became a talent agent at the boutique talent agency, Susan Smith and Associates in Los Angeles. Subsequently, Wagner was hired in the talent department at Creative Artists Agency (CAA) in Los Angeles, where she signed and represented Tom Cruise.{{Cite web|url=https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/hollywood-flashback-tom-cruise-reveals-912465|title=Hollywood Flashback: Tom Cruise Reveals How He Landed His First Hollywood Agent at 19|website=The Hollywood Reporter|date=July 20, 2016}} In July 1992, after representing Cruise for eleven years, she and Cruise co-founded the independent film production company Cruise/Wagner Productions.{{cite news|title=Cruise makes a picture deal |publisher=Lima News |work=NewspaperARCHIVE.com |page=A4 |date=November 4, 1992}}{{Cite web|title=The Los Angeles Times from Los Angeles, California on July 13, 1992 · Page 152|url=http://www.newspapers.com/newspage/177328500/|access-date=2022-02-26|website=Newspapers.com|date=July 13, 1992 |language=en}}{{Cite web|work=Evening Standard |title=Tom Cruise forms his own film company |quote=Scroll down to 'Show 12 article text' |issn=2041-4404 |date=July 14, 1992 |page=12 |url=http://www.newspapers.com/newspage/725459662/|access-date=2022-02-26|location=Newspapers.com|language=en}} For the next fourteen years, Wagner and Cruise produced a wide range of films that earned numerous awards and widespread critical praise, and were global box office successes. The first film released under the C/W Productions 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 Productions 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). C/W Productions was responsible for the original Mission: Impossible film trilogy (Mission: Impossible 2 and Mission: Impossible III). In all, films produced by C/W Productions earned more than $2.9 billion in worldwide box office receipts.{{cite web |url=http://sev.prnewswire.com/entertainment/20061102/LATH10602112006-1.html |title=Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc. :: MGM Partners with Tom Cruise and Paula Wagner to Form New United Artists |website=sev.prnewswire.com |access-date=12 January 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080929115013/http://sev.prnewswire.com/entertainment/20061102/LATH10602112006-1.html |archive-date=29 September 2008 |url-status=dead}}

Wagner continues to work as a film producer and studio executive, developing films, theatre, and television through her company Chestnut Ridge Productions.Healy, Patrick, [https://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/04/theater/paula-wagner-turns-to-producing-on-broadway.html "Hollywood Player Joins the Club on Broadway"], New York Times, November 1, 2012. "Paula Wagner turns to producing on Broadway." Retrieved November 4, 2012.

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.{{Cite web|url=https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5301662/awards|title = Marshall - IMDb|website = IMDb}}

=Theatre producer=

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.{{Cite web|url=https://www.ibdb.com/broadway-production/the-heiress-493115|title = The Heiress – Broadway Play – 2012 Revival | IBDB}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.ibdb.com/broadway-production/grace-493112|title = Grace – Broadway Play – Original | IBDB}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.ibdb.com/broadway-production/mothers-and-sons-495880|title = Mothers and Sons – Broadway Play – Original | IBDB}}

=Other producing=

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. She 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.{{Cite web|url=https://www.oscars.org/news/paula-wagner-produce-2013-governors-awards|title = Paula Wagner to Produce 2013 Governors Awards|date = August 21, 2014}}{{cite web |url=https://www.producersguild.org/news/80252/PGA-ANNOUNCES-THEATRICAL-MOTION-PICTURE-AND-LONG-FORM-TELEVISION-NOMINATIONS-FOR-2012-PGA-AWARDS.htm |title=PGA ANNOUNCES THEATRICAL MOTION PICTURE AND LONG-FORM TELEVISION NOMINATIONS FOR 2012 PGA AWARDS - Producers Guild of America |website=www.producersguild.org |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120108051113/http://www.producersguild.org/news/80252/PGA-ANNOUNCES-THEATRICAL-MOTION-PICTURE-AND-LONG-FORM-TELEVISION-NOMINATIONS-FOR-2012-PGA-AWARDS.htm |archive-date=2012-01-08}}{{Cite web|url=https://deadline.com/2010/08/paula-wagner-tapped-for-producers-guild-awards-59938/|title = Paula Wagner to Produce PGA Awards|date = August 5, 2010}}

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.{{Cite web|url=https://www.cmu.edu/news/archive/2010/May/may7_wagnertepperkeynote.shtml|title=May 7: Hollywood Producer Paula Wagner to Deliver Keynote Address for Tepper School of Business Diploma Ceremony - Carnegie Mellon University | CMU}}

Wagner is a member of the American Cinematheque's Board of Directors{{Cite web|url=https://americancinematheque.com/about-us/|title=About}} and the Executive Committee of the UCLA’s School of Theater, Film and Television.{{Cite web|url=http://www.tft.ucla.edu/about/executive-board/paula-wagner/|title = Paula Wagner| work=UCLA School of TFT }} 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.{{Cite web|url=https://womenandhollywood.com/reframe-pushes-for-more-inclusive-hiring-in-hollywood-with-new-handbook-49b05f45c7a9/|title = ReFrame Pushes for More Inclusive Hiring in Hollywood with New Handbook}}

=Awards and accolades=

Wagner was honored by Premiere magazine with the Women in Hollywood Icon Award in 2001.{{Cite web|url=https://www.alamy.com/los-angeles-ca-october-22-2001-producer-paula-wagner-at-premiere-magazines-women-in-hollywood-luncheon-at-the-four-seasons-hotel-beverly-hills-she-was-honored-with-the-magazines-icon-award-paul-smithfeatureflash-image243049337.html|title = LOS ANGELES, CA. October 22, 2001: Producer PAULA WAGNER at Premiere Magazine's Women in Hollywood luncheon at the Four Seasons Hotel, Beverly Hills. She was honored with the magazine's Icon Award. © Paul Smith/Featureflash Stock Photo - Alamy}} In October 2006, she received the Sherry Lansing Award from the Big Brothers and Big Sisters Organization.{{Cite web|url=https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/clips-121711|title=CLIPS|website=The Hollywood Reporter|date=October 24, 2008}} She was also honored by the Costume Designers Guild with its Swarovski President's Award in 2008.{{Cite web|url=https://www.zimbio.com/photos/Paula+Wagner/10th+Annual+Costume+Designers+Guild+Awards/BmwJNt28Tnc|title = Paula Wagner Photostream}} In 2012, she was an honoree at the Deauville Film Festival.{{Cite web|url=https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/deauville-american-film-festival-step-343530/|title = Deauville American Film Festival to Step up Its Industry Angle|website = The Hollywood Reporter|date = June 29, 2012}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.festival-deauville.com/en/the-festival/|title=The festival}} She was one of the recipients of the Women in Film Crystal + Lucy Awards in 2016,Women in Film Crystal + Lucy Awards{{Circular reference|date=February 2021}} and the Camerimage Producer with Unique Visual Sensitivity award in 2017.{{Cite web|url=https://camerimage.pl/en/paula-wagner-z-nagroda-camerimage-dla-producentki/|title=PAULA WAGNER WITH CAMERIMAGE PRODUCer's AWARD – EnergaCAMERIMAGE 2021}} Her film Marshall won the Chicago “audience film festival award”.{{Cite web|url=https://www.chicagofilmfestival.com/53rd-festival-top-audience-awards-winners/|title=53rd Festival - Top Audience Awards Winners|date=October 30, 2017}}

Personal life

Wagner is married to Rick Nicita, CEO of management and production company RP Media.{{citation needed|date=July 2023}}

Filmography

She was a producer in all films unless otherwise noted.

=Film=

class="wikitable" style="font-size:95%;" ! style="background:#B0C4DE;" \| Year ! style="background:#B0C4DE;" \| Film ! style="background:#B0C4DE;" \| Credit ! style="background:#B0C4DE;" \| Notes
1996	Mission: Impossible
1998	Without Limits
2000	Mission: Impossible 2
rowspan=2\| 2001	The Others	Executive producer
Vanilla Sky
2002	Narc	Executive producer
rowspan=2\| 2003	Shattered Glass	Executive producer
The Last Samurai
2004	Suspect Zero
rowspan=2\| 2005	War of the Worlds	Executive producer
Elizabethtown
rowspan=2\| 2006	Ask the Dust
Mission: Impossible III
rowspan=2\| 2008	The Eye
Death Race
2010	Death Race 2	Executive producer	Direct-to-video
2012	Jack Reacher
2016	Jack Reacher: Never Go Back	Executive producer
2017	Marshall