Howard Zieff was born on October 21, 1927 in Chicago, Illinois, USA as Howard B. Zieff. He was a director and producer, known for My Girl (1991), Private Benjamin (1980) and My Girl 2 (1994). He was married to Ronda Gomez-Quinones. He died on February 21, 2009 in Los Angeles, California, USA.
On photographing in 1967 for the "You don't have to be Jewish to love Levy's" ad campaign: We wanted normal-looking people, not blond, perfectly proportioned models. I saw the Indian on the street; he was an engineer for the New York Central. The Chinese guy worked in a restaurant near my Midtown Manhattan office. And the kid we found in Harlem. They all had great faces, interesting faces, expressive faces.
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Fact
1
Before going into the movies, he was responsible for many memorable advertising campaigns. Most memorable was the Alka-Seltzer "Spicy Meatball" commercial in which an actor must work through repeated takes for a tomato sauce.
2
Howard Zieff's early ad campaigns were noted for their innovative casting. Breaking from the stereotypical blond-haired, blue-eyed, old Hollywood ideal of perfection, he cast young unknowns with decidedly ethnic, un-Hollywood features, including Robert De Niro, Dustin Hoffman and Richard Dreyfuss.
3
Was original choice to direct Punchline (1988) when it was written in the end of 1970s.
$300,000
