Brian June

Education

June attended Webster University in Saint Louis, where he learned the basics of filmmaking.

Career

June has made two short films, Jimmy Brown and Researching Raymond Burke. The film also received a nomination for the grand prize jury award at the Sundance Film Festival in 2006. As of June 2008, his second feature film The Thacker Case is in post-production.

Since he was a child, June always had an interest in film and literature and, inspired by the work of Sam Shepard, Neil Simon and Samuel Beckett, he began to create his own characters and to write screenplays.

June"s first work was the short film Jimmy Brown, an hospital drama dealing with racial issues. The film was based around conversations between two characters, played by Dennis Lebby and June himself.

A screening of the film at Los Angeles Shorts Film Festival led to the opportunity to make another short for Fox Searchlab. A program run by Fox Searchlight Pictures with the aim of nurturing up-and-coming talent.

The result of this was Researching Raymond Burke, a short featuring John Heard.

June"s original plan was for this to be a tester to a feature film entitled In the World of Raymond Burke but he did not manage to acquire the capital to produce the film and the project was abandoned. The collapse of this project inspired June to make his next film on a much lower budget. The product of this was the film John Heard had remained interested in working with June and his involvement with the new film led to interest from Your Half Pictures.

This marked the end of two years of searching for a production company as the Los Angeles firm agreed to produce the film.

The idea of family breakdown interested June and a mix of this idea with midwestern economic downturn formed the basis for In addition to Heard, the film starred America Ferrera and Raymond J. Barry, who later received a nomination for best supporting actor from the Spirit Awards for his role in the film. The film received a nomination for the grand prize jury award following its screening at the Sundance Film Festival in 2006.

The film was generally received well by critics: reviews from both The New York Times and Entertainment Weekly praised the strength in depth of the supporting characters. However both also acknowledged the debut film"s flaws.

The New York Times notes flaws in the script: "Heard has to utter the wince-inducing line "I wanted to be a better dad," but mostly Mr.

June"s script is sharp". Entertainment Weekly summarised that "could have used more rhythmic drive, but if June keeps weaving together characters this compelling, he could be a major film artist in the making". Time Out also pointed out that the film had the teething problems of a first effort but otherwise praised the script and the casts performance.

Following the success of June was offered more filmmaking work.

This included his self-penned second feature film The Thacker Case, a drama featuring Eliza Dushku. As of June 2008 The Thacker Case is in post-production and the Jeff Buckley biopic remains in the script writing stage.

June served as a "screen writer in residence" at Interlochen Arts Academy High School in 2011-2012.

Achievements

• June won the Sundance Channel Emerging Director Award in 2006 at the Saint Louis Film Festival for his first feature film.