Sandor Stern

Born in the northern Canadian town of Timmins, Ontario; raised in the small town of Prescott, Ontario, on the St. Lawrence River; Sandor Stern was drawn to short story writing while in high school and began writing stage plays while attending the University of Toronto. Though he planned to obtain a degree in teaching, a physician-uncle suggested that medicine might offer more involving experiences for an aspiring writer. Heeding that advice, Stern enrolled in Medical School at the University of Toronto. During his schooling, he continued to write, switching to TV scripts, and selling his first script to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation prior to his graduation in 1961. Setting up a private practice in Toronto, Stern continued to write; adding songwriting and variety sketch writing to his credits. Over the next five years, he wrote numerous shows for the CBC until demand for his work allowed him to give up the practice of medicine and devote full time to writing. He wrote the CTV network's first drama, _Rumble of Silence (????) (TV)_, and created the CBC network's medical series, Corwin (1969). Deciding to try his luck in Hollywood, Stern arrived in LA and immediately landed an assignment to write an episode of NBC's, "Bold Ones, The". He quickly moved on to other episodic dramas, Ironside (1967), 0066681 and onto producing with Mod Squad (1968) and Doc Elliot (1973). His TV movie producing began in 1976 with The Strange and Deadly Occurrence (1974). In 1979 The Seeding of Sarah Burns (1979) was his first directing assignment. Since then he has written and/or directed more than 35 movies, including the screenplays for three feature films; The Amityville Horror (1979), Fast Break (1979) (winner of the 1978 NAACP Image Award for best screenplay) and Pin (1988) (which he also directed). Stern is married to Kandy Stern, an artist, production designer and producer, with whom he co-wrote and co-produced the NBC movie, Deception: A Mother's Secret (1991) and co-produced the USA Cable movie, Jericho Fever (1993). His recent credits include director on the ABC movie The Stranger Beside Me (1995) and the NBC movie Gridlock (1996).