Larry Peerce — Director | Biography, Movies & Career

Biography

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Lawrence "Larry" Peerce (born April 19, 1930) is an American film and TV director whose work includes the theatrical feature Goodbye, Columbus, the early rock and roll concert film The Big T.N.T. Show, One Potato, Two Potato (1964), The Other Side of the Mountain (1975), and Oscar nominee Two-Minute Warning (1976).

The son of operatic tenor Jan Peerce and talent agent Alice (Kalmanowitz) Peerce, Larry Peerce was born in The Bronx, New York City, New York. He attended the University of North Carolina. He made his directing debut with One Potato, Two Potato, released in 1964 by the distributor Cinema V. The groundbreaking drama about an interracial marriage between a white divorcee (played by Barbara Barrie, who won the Best Actress award at the 1964 Cannes Film Festival for the role) and an African-American office worker (Bernie Hamilton) was the first U.S. movie to portray such an interracial relationship.

Peerce went on to direct several episodes of the Western television series Branded and the campy superhero series Batman, among other shows, before directing the early rock and roll concert film The Big T.N.T. Show, released in 1966 by American International Pictures and featuring such performers as The Byrds, Ray Charles, Bo Diddley, Donovan, The Lovin' Spoonful, The Ronettes and The Ike & Tina Turner Revue.

Following more TV, Peerce returned to film in 1967 with The Mystery of the Chinese Junk and The Incident, the latter of which starred Martin Sheen and Tony Musante. He followed this with the acclaimed Goodbye, Columbus, an adaptation of the Philip Roth novel. The movie earned Peerce a DGA Award nomination for Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures, and screenwriter Arnold Schulman an Academy Award nomination for Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium.

Peerce's subsequent theatrical features included The Sporting Club, A Separate Peace, Ash Wednesday, and The Other Side of the Mountain. Peerce's work is frequently viewed as part of the expressive sentimental directorial style with a particular focus on coming-of-age stories.