Hal Ackerman

• Sr. Lecturer. SOE
• Office: 3346 Macgowan
• E-mail:
• Phone: 310-206-6851

Biography

Hal Ackerman has been on the faculty of the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television for the past twenty-two years and is currently co-chair of the screenwriting program. Among his close mentees are Sacha Gervasi, Pamela Gray, Scott Kosar, Nicholas Griffin and many others.

His book “Write Screenplays That Sell…The Ackerman Way” is now in its third printing and is becoming the text of choice in a growing number of screenwriting programs around the country.

Ackerman has had numerous short stories published in literary journals over the past two years, including “New Millennium Writing,” “The Pinch,” “Words and Pictures,” “Southeast Review” and “Passages.”

His short story, “Roof Garden” just won the Warren Adler 2008 award for fiction and is published by Kindle. “Alfalfa” was included in the 2006 anthology “I Wanna Be Sedated… 30 Writers on Parenting Teenagers.” Among the twenty-nine “other writers” were Louise Erdrich, Dave Barry, Anna Quindlen, Roz Chast, and Barbara Kingsolver. “Sweet Day” is just out on HarperCollins Publishers Digital Media Cafe read by Academy Award nominee Robert Forster.

Ackerman has sold material to all the networks and major studios. His play, “Testosterone: How Prostate Cancer Made a Man of Me,” which just concluded its premier theatrical run in Santa Monica, CA, won the William Saroyan Centennial Award for drama and is currently under option for a Television movie.