Thomas Linden Neff, known as
Tom Neff, is a film executive, director and producer, born in
Chicago, Illinois. Currently, he lives in
Nashville,
Tennessee.
Education
Neff received his
Bachelor of Arts from
Lawrence University with a major in English. In 1981, he completed a
Master of Fine Arts at the
School of Cinematic Arts at the
University of Southern California.
Career
Neff is the founder and
CEO of
DOC: The Documentary Channel, the first channel in the United States to show documentaries on a full-time basis. The Documentary Channel was created in 1998 and is currently on the
DISH Network, Channel 197. Neff is also a documentary film producer and director.
Neff's films have won several national and international awards, including an
Academy Award nomination and an
Emmy win. In
1983 he began Tennessee's first feature film production company, Horizon Films, and wrote and directed the feature film
Running Mates (
1985) distributed worldwide by
New World Pictures.
In the early 1990s, with partner Diandra Douglas, Neff co-founded and ran Wild Wolf Productions, a California-based (
Culver City) documentary film production company that produced
Beatrice Wood: Mama of Dada (
1993) and
America's Music: The Roots of Country (
1996).
More recently, Neff produced, wrote, and directed the 30-minute documentary,
Herb Alpert: Music for Your Eyes, on the art and sculpture of musician
Herb Alpert (
2003);
Country Music: The Spirit of America, (2003), an
IMAX film which traces the history of the
United States in the 20th Century through country music; and
Chances: The Women of Magdalene (
2006), his most recent feature-length documentary on the socially conscious organization Magdalene, located in Nashville, that recovers prostitutes off the street.
He has served on the Board of the
International Documentary Association, the Tennessee Governor's Film Advisory Board, the Board of Directors of the
Watkins College of Art&Design in Nashville, was Chairman of Finance on the
Belcourt Theater board, and was co-chairman of the
Nashville Film Festival. He is a member of the
Academy of Television Arts & Sciences and the
Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, where he sat on the Nominating Committee for Best Documentary. Neff has participated on various documentary panels at film festivals around the world.
Teaching
Neff has taught at his
alma mater as an adjunct professor (School of Cinematic Arts at USC). In the 1990s he taught a course on music video production. His students taking the course (USC Cinema 499) shot various music videos for country music artists such as
Radney Foster, and others. Neff obtained financing for the program from various records labels, such as
Arista Nashville.
Filmography (producing and directing)
Feature filmsShort documentaries- A Lady as Game as That ()
- Pat Kerr: Wrapped in Royalty ()
Feature documentariesTelevision documentariesAwards
Wins- CINE: Golden Eagle, for: Red Grooms: Sunflower in a Hothouse; .
- CINE: Golden Eagle, for: Frederic Remington: The Truth of Other Days; .
- CINE: Golden Eagle, for: Beatrice Wood: Mama of Dada; .
- Sichuan Television Festival, Chengdu China: Golden Panda award, Beatrice Wood: Mama of Dada; 1993. Note: First American documentary to win this award.
- Nashville Film Festival: Audience Award for Best Documentary, Tom Neff, for: Chances: The Women of Magdalene; .
Nominations
