Mark Pellington Q&A

Live Q&A with Mark Pellington

Hosted by Dr. Rhonda Matthews

Mark graduated from the University of Virginia in 1984, with a B.A. in Rhetoric and Communication Studies. He attended on an athletic scholarship, playing attack on the Varsity lacrosse team.

He worked at pioneering video channel MTV from 1984–1990, winning awards as a promo producer and co- creating the seminal landmark TV documentary series Buzz (1990).

He became a freelance director in 1988, directing music videos for U2, Malcolm McLaren, Crystal Waters, De la Soul , PM Dawn, and Pearl Jam. His video for Pearl Jam’s “Jeremy” won four MTV awards in 1993, including Best Director and Video of the Year, and his video for Whale’s song “Hobo Humpin’ Slobo Babe” won the inaugural MTV Europe Music Award for Best Video in 1994.

Pellington then began directing feature films, including Going All the Way (1997), starring Ben Affleck and Rachel Weisz, Arlington Road (1999), starring Tim Robbins and Jeff Bridges, as well as The Mothman Prophecies (2002), starring Richard Gere.

Pellington has also created over 100 iconic music videos and worked with such musical artists as U2, R.E.M., Bruce Springsteen, Alice In Chains, Demi Lovato, Imagine Dragons, Foo Fighters, Nine Inch Nails, Cage the Elephant, Jon Bon Jovi, Linkin Park, Echosmith, The Fray, Dave Matthews, Michael Jackson, Public Enemy, Moby, Flaming Lips, Nada Surf, Damian Marley, Chelsea Wolfe and many more.

He also made cameo acting appearances in The Mothman Prophecies, Almost Famous, and Jerry Maguire.

He directed the landmark mini-series The United States of Poetry for PBS in 1995, which won the INPUT (International Public Television) Award, AIDS awareness doc film Red Hot and Dance (1992) and created the look of pilots for hit network TV , directing and producing shows including Blindspot (2015), Red Widow (2014) , The Enemy Within (2018) and Cold Case (2003-2009), as well as numerous commercials, personal documentaries, TV episodes. music films, art projects and shorts.

Feature film-wise, he has also directed:
co-directed U2 3D (2005), featuring U2
Henry Poole Is Here (2008),Luke Wilson and George Lopez
I Melt with You (2011), with Rob Lowe and Thomas Jane
The Last Word (2017), with Shirley MacLaine and Amanda Seyfried
Nostalgia (2018), Jon Hamm, Ellen Burstyn, Catherine Keener and Bruce Dern
Survive (2020) Sophie Turner and Corey Hawkins.
The Severing (2022)
Going All the Way -directors cut (2022)

Pellington lives in Los Angeles with his daughter and runs his company Prolific Films.