Barry Josephson
American film producer

Barry Josephson is an American film producer and former music manager.
Life and career
After attending the McBurney School in New York City, Josephson graduated from American University, Washington DC in 1978, and was an active member of its American University School of Communication Alumni program. Josephson served as vice president, then President, of Production for Columbia Pictures from 1991 to 1997, and produced films and television for studios and networks such as The Walt Disney Company, 20th Century Fox, Sony Pictures Television, and AMC from 1997 onward.
Josephson began his career in entertainment at Landers/Roberts Productions, overseeing the music division's interest in feature film and television programming and there was involved with the popular sequel, Death Wish II (1982). Josephson later worked for Gallin/Morey & Associates, managing the careers of such performers as Paula Abdul, Patti LaBelle, Morris Day, and Whoopi Goldberg (including production work on her Grammy-winning album "Direct from Broadway"). During this time, Josephson also helped found Sandollar Films, whose production has included several of Dolly Parton's made-for-TV movies and specials; Tidy Endings, an HBO adaptation of Harvey Fierstein's play, Safe Sex; and such feature films as Gross Anatomy and True Identity (both 1989). Before moving to Columbia, Josephson worked with Joel Silver of Silver Pictures on Die Hard 2 and Predator 2 (both 1990), earned executive producer credit on both Ricochet and The Last Boy Scout (both 1991), and oversaw production of 14 episodes of the HBO series, Tales from the Crypt.
In 1991 he became Vice President of Production for Columbia Pictures, where his diverse background in film, TV, and music production came to bear upon the projects he oversaw. He remained at the studio for six years, serving the last three as President of Production. During his tenure at Columbia, Josephson was responsible for such popular films as In the Line of Fire (1993), Bad Boys (1995), Men in Black, Air Force One, The Fifth Element, and Anaconda (all 1997).
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Barry Josephson” as american film producer. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the arts & letters register because the source frames it as american film producer. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Reception evidence should be dated and situated: later canonical status may differ sharply from the work’s initial circulation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 15, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q4864368. VIAF identifies the subject as 120656863. The Library of Congress control number is no2018176208. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1978, 1991, 1997 and 1982.
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This entry incorporates text from “Barry Josephson” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.