Philip J Day

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Philip J Day
Phil J Day.jpg
Born
Harrogate, England
OccupationFilmmaker, founder and president of Edge West Productions, writer, producer, and director
WebsiteEdgewest.com

Philip J Day is a British film producer, screenwriter and showrunner.

His films have been awarded with a Peabody, two Emmy's, seven Emmy nominations, and twenty-one Telly Awards. His credits include, Sky TV, NBC, Turner Broadcasting System, PBS, BBC TV, National Geographic Channel, Discovery, Channel Four (UK), The History Channel, Science Channel, Travel Channel, TLC and PBS.

As a TV showrunner, Day has collaborated with major production companies on series, such as Stan Lee's Lucky Man, Kindred Spirits, Blood Relatives and Love Kills for Investigation Discovery, Alaska: The Last Frontier for Discovery, and National Geographic Explorer.

Day formed his production company Edge West Productions in 2008, to develop and produce movies and TV shows for multiple broadcasters in different genres. Since inception the company has produced and collaborated on over two hundred hours of television, such as, Curiosity (TV Series) Volcano Time Bomb, Inside Rio Carnival, The Real Roswell, Tunnel to a Lost World, Lost Cities of the Amazon, The Skyjacker That Got Away, Great Escape: The Final Secrets, and Nasca Lines The Buried Secrets.

Family[]

Philip Day is the youngest of three children. Son of Hazel Day, a notable actress and opera singer and Brian Day, a chartered accountant. Hazel is most well known for performances with the York light Opera Company. Her most popular performances were in Kiss Me Kate,[1] Song of Norway,[2] and finally Kismet.[3]

Education[]

The Day family moved to Zambia in Africa when Philip was eleven years-old. While living in Zambia, Day attended the Peterhouse Boys' School in Marondera, in the neighboring country of Zimbabwe. He moved back to England to finish high school at Ackworth School in West Yorkshire. Day attended film school at Harrow College. He obtained a BA(hons) in Photography, Film, and Television.

Career[]

Philip J Day (sometimes credited as Phil Day or Philip Day) has produced over two hundred hours of television and several feature films. He is credited as executive producer, producer, director and writer on over three hundred network shows. He has specialized in social, historical, and scientific films using elaborate recreations and dynamic interviews to tell his stories.

In 2020 Day directed the six-part, crime series Dying To Be Famous, about the death of black model, Ryan Singleton, which aired on Bounce TV. Earlier in 2020, Day was brought in as Showrunner to bring a new direction to the paranormal investigative series, Kindred Spirits, in its fifth season. Airs January 2021.

In 2019, The Russian Bride, starring Corbin Bernsen and Kristina Pimenova, which Day produced, was chosen to close the Fantasporto International Film Festival, in Portugal on March 2nd, 2019,[4] and was released worldwide in 2019 by VMI Distribution. His previous movies The Amityville Terror (2016) and Euroclub (2018) performed well on Showtime and Netflix.

In recent years he has been working as a freelance Executive Producer and Showrunner on TV series, such as Stan Lee's Lucky Man for Sky 1, "Navy Seals: America's Secret Warriors" for History (U.S. TV network), "Polar Bear Town" for the Smithsonian Institution, Blood Relatives and Love Kills for Investigation Discovery, Alaska: The Last Frontier for Discovery and Sex Sent Me to the ER for TLC.

For three years, between 2016 and 2018, Day worked with notable comic book author Stan Lee on Stan Lee's Lucky Man. Day also worked with director Robert Rodriguez for the highly regarded BBC showTen Minute Film School.[5] Day wrote and directed nearly twenty TV shows for National Geographic including a film about D. B. Cooper,[6] a man who has eluded the FBI for over thirty years.[7]

Many of his films explore ancient civilizations. Lost Cities of the Amazon for National Geographic investigates the tragic loss of life to indigenous Amerindians along the Amazon River from disease like influenza brought unwittingly by Spanish Conquistadors after 1492 (some experts believe up to ninety percent of the population perished in the first century of white explorers). Day also works on more scientific based series. His documentary on ancient medicine explores the origins of plastic surgery to 3,000 years before Hollywood face-lifts.

His two-hour film about the Luxor massacre[8][9] Massacre in Luxor[10] was considered a marquee documentary for both PBS and BBC.

Day established a strong relationship with American broadcasters, such as PBS the History Channel and the Discovery Channel. Day's most notable films during this period include Hello Mr. President, which won him a prestigious Peabody Award and an Emmy Nomination. The eminent journalist Sir Charles Wheeler wrote and narrated the documentary on Lyndon B Johnson. The documentary spawned a multi-part TV series called 'The Whitehouse Tapes' History Channel. The prestigious series went on to win an Emmy Award, five Emmy Award nominations, a Royal Television Society award, and multiple other awards and nominations.

In 2000, Day created an award-winning series for TLC called Why Doctors Make Mistakes. A year later Day produced the highly rated TV show High Stakes: Bet Your Life on Vegas which partnered the director with Emmy Award winning actor Ray Liotta.[11] A year later Day used his Hollywood contacts to launch a major BBC/Discovery three-part series, The Hollywood Machine, (aka Hollywood, Inc.) The series examined the key reasons behind blockbuster success and dismal failure. Denzel Washington, Hugh Jackman, and Jude Law are just a few of the luminaries who appear in the series. The Times of London, described the series as "highly entertaining", The Observer wrote it was "a must for all aspirants of film".

In 2001 Day directed the International Emmy Award Nominee Challenger: Go For Launch.

In 2006 Day moved to California, where he set up his production company Edge West Productions. Between 2008 and 2018 Edge West won thirteen Telly Awards for productions like The Skyjacker That Got Away for National Geographic Channel. In 2010 Philip J. Day was nominated for an Emmy Award at the 2010 News and Documentary Emmy Awards for the film The Skyjacker That Got Away.[12] In both 2014 & 2015 his series Alaska: The Last Frontier was nominated for a News and Documentary Emmy Award.

Held At Gunpoint[]

In 2009 Day and his team had been filming in the desert of southern Peru on a film about the Nazca Lines for National Geographic Channel. At around 3.45 am five armed men, wearing face masks, scaled a twenty-foot wall to break into the hotel where Day and his team were asleep. The assailants first took the receptionist and hotel manager hostage at gunpoint. The receptionist was bound and gagged while the manager was forced to provide a master key for all the bedrooms. The attackers had specifically come to steal expensive film equipment. They beat up several people and stole some equipment, but the actions of hotel staff saved the crew from a more severe and potentially life-threatening robbery.[13]

Collaborations[]

Philip Day has worked with many major celebrities including Stan Lee on Stan Lee's Lucky Man, Mick Jagger Passion, Pride & Penalties, Henry Rollins on Inside the Warrior Gene, Craig Ferguson in My Friend Hellman & Friday at the Dome, Lisa Ling on National Geographic's Explorer, Alan Rickman Tango With Ninagawa, Ray Liotta High Stakes: Bet Your Life on Vegas, Brian Cox The Late Show, Peter Coyote National Geographic Explorer, Akiva Goldsman, Ridley Scott, Kathleen Kennedy Hollywood Inc., Morwenna Banks Signals, and Jon Ronson The Ronson Mission.

Credits[]

Awards[]

  • Telly Awards – New York, 2018 "San Diego: City of the Future"
  • Primetime Emmy Nominee – New York 2015 "Alaska: The Last Frontier"
  • Primetime Emmy Nominee – New York 2014 "Alaska: The Last Frontier"
  • Telly Awards – New York, 2013 "Party Like The Queen of France"
  • Telly Awards – New York, 2013 "Party Like A Roman Emperor"
  • Telly Awards – New York, 2013 "Party Like The Rich & Famous"
  • Telly Awards – New York, 2012 "Crime Lords of Tokyo"
  • Telly Awards – New York, 2011 "Born to Rage"
  • Telly Awards – New York, 2011 "Vanished From Alcatraz"
  • News and Documentary Emmy Nominee – New York 2010 "The Skyjacker That Got Away"
  • Telly Awards – New York, 2010 "The Skyjacker That Got Away"
  • Telly Awards – New York, 2010 "Great Escape: The Final Secrets"
  • Telly Awards – New York, 2010 "Lost Cities of the Amazon"
  • Telly Awards – New York, 2010 "Tunnel To A Lost World"
  • News and Documentary International Emmy Award– New York 2004 "The Johnson Tapes"
  • Telly Awards – New York, 2002 "Challenger: Go For Launch"
  • News and Documentary Emmy Nominee – New York 2002 "Challenger: Go For Launch"
  • British Medical Association Certificate of Educational Merit, London 2000 – "Why Doctors Make Mistakes"
  • News and Documentary Emmy Nominee – New York 2000 "The Johnson Tapes"
  • Telly Awards – New York, 2000 "The Johnson Tapes"
  • Best Historical Documentary – Grierson Award Finalist, 1998 "Hello Mr. President"
  • Peabody Award Winner – New York 1998 "Hello Mr. President"
  • Best Music and Arts Series – UK Indie Awards, London 1997 "Moving Pictures"

References[]

  1. ^ “York Light Production 1964.”
  2. ^ “York Light Production 1965.”
  3. ^ “York Light Production 1966.”
  4. ^ "Fantasporto Closes with Russian Bride"
  5. ^ “BBC Moving Pictures gives movie maverick, Robert Rodriguez, the opportunity to teach a class of film students everything there is to know about filmmaking in just ten minutes.”
  6. ^ “Sky Jacker vanishes without a trace.” Archived 15 March 2010 at the Wayback Machine
  7. ^ “Sky Jacker eludes FBI for over thirty years.”
  8. ^ “Insight: The Death of Innocents: The Luxor Massacre.”
  9. ^ BBC News: Friday, 6 December, 2002."Massacre in Luxor."
  10. ^ “”
  11. ^ “High Stakes: Bet Your Life on Vegas”
  12. ^ Director And Cameraman Philip J Day is nominated for an Emmy for "The Skyjacker That Got Away" Archived 14 September 2010 at the Wayback Machine
  13. ^ “Robbers Hold Up NatGeo Team At Nasca Hotel.”

External links[]

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