Thom Mount
Thom Mount, a graduate of Bard College (BA) and California Institute of the Arts (MFA), entered the film business by working on productions for the legendary Roger Corman while still in graduate school, then developing scripts for producers Daniel Selznick and Hannah Weinstein, before joining Universal Pictures in early 1973. During college and beyond, he worked as a journalist for an eclectic assortment of publications, including Liberation News Service, The Village Voice, The Poughkeepsie Journal, Interview, and a weekly column in the Durham Morning Herald.
During 13 years at Universal, Mount rose from assistant to film VP Ned Tanen, to president of Universal Pictures Worldwide at 26. He served as Universal president for nine years, leaving the studio in 1985.
Among the notable films Thom developed, supervised, financed, and/or distributed at Universal were Carwash, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Slapshot, Smokey and the Bandit, Blue Collar, Animal House, The Wiz, Same Time Next Year, The Deer Hunter, The Jerk, Electric Horseman, A Coal Miner's Daughter, The Blues Brothers, American Werewolf in London, Zoot Suit, On Golden Pond, Missing, Cat People, Conan the Barbarian, The Thing, Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, Sophie's Choice, Tender Mercies, Monty Python's The Meaning of Life, Pretty in Pink, Rumble Fish, Scarface, Sixteen Candles, Dune, The Breakfast Club, and Back to the Future, along with about 200 others.
After his work at Universal, Mount founded an independent production company, producing 27 features over 20 years, including Bull Durham, Can't Buy Me Love, Roman Polanski's Frantic, Tequila Sunrise, Natural Born Killers, Death and the Maiden, Night Falls on Manhattan, and Cheri. He produced Open Admissions, Son of the Morning Star, and HBO's The Comedy Experiment for television, as well as the Broadway and West End theater productions Death and the Maiden, Open Admissions, and Into the Woods.
Mount served four years as President of the Producers Guild of America and co-founded the Los Angeles Film School. He joined the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in 1977 and remains active there.
Dubbed a "Baby Mogul" by New York Magazine, he survived that appellation and has been accused of being the "model" for the studio head in Robert Altman's The Player. Mount responded, "Not me, I've never murdered a screenwriter. Yet."
Thom Mount’s debut novel, the neo-noir detective fiction Rafferty Returns, will be in bookstores June 24, 2025. The novel has received raves from filmmaker Oliver Stone (Born on the Fourth of July, Wall Street), author Jerry Petievich (To Live and Die in L.A.), author Gus Russo (Supermob), editor Terry McDonell (Rolling Stone, Esquire, Sports Ilustrated), artist Ed Ruscha, and more. Mount is hard at work on the second book in the Rafferty series. He lives and works in Los Angeles and the California desert.
