Contributor

Matthew Cooke

Writer-Director, <i>How To Make Money Selling Drugs</i>

Matthew Cooke's formative years were split between NY and DC -- studying music and acting. Then to Chicago where Cooke landed his first graphic design job: making fake IDs. Unsatisfied with a life of crime, Cooke graduated from Pitzer College in 1996 with a B.A. in Film, magna cum laude.

In 1999, Cooke and two partners working out of his garage raised investment capital from AOL, Time-Warner and Intel to build the first broadband search engine for Time-Warner's RoadRunner network. As Executive Creative Director, Cooke earned a "Best of the Web" Design Award from Print Magazine. And later, a "webby".

In 2000, Cooke taught as a professor of digital arts at Otis College of Art & Design. And for the next 5 years would continue to design, art direct, edit and animate for projects serving clients from Disney and GM to Prince.

In 2006 Cooke produced and edited his first feature film. Deliver Us from Evil (an expose of the sex abuse crisis in the Catholic Church) won numerous awards and made over forty critics' 2006 "best of" lists. In 2007 the film received the Academy Award nomination for Best Documentary Feature.

In 2007 Cooke did a short stint as a writer/director/actor for Fuel TV's variety show, StupidFace. Cooke's sketches guest starred some amazing cast members from Mr. Show, the Sarah Silverman Program, Arrested Development, the Drew Carey Show and more.

In 2008 Cooke produced long time friend and collaborator Adrian Grenier's (HBO's Entourage) "Teenage Paparazzo" for HBO featuring Matt Damon, Alec Baldwin, Whoopi Goldberg, Rosie ODonnell, Noam Chomsky and Lewis Black. The film premiered at Sundance in 2010.

In 2012 Cooke completed "How To Make Money Selling Drugs" as writer-director available on June 18th via iTunes, cable on-demand etc and in select theaters June / July 2013.

Cooke's company Saturday Entertainment is currently in development on another documentary and a science fiction thriller.