Phillips, Julia Miller

▪ 2003

      American film producer and writer (b. April 7, 1944, New York, N.Y.—d. Jan. 1, 2002, West Hollywood, Calif.), in the 1970s became one of the very few women to have attained a position of power in the world of Hollywood filmmaking, was a co-producer of several of the decade's most successful motion pictures, and for one of those movies—The Sting—became the first woman to win a best-picture Academy Award. Her fame turned to notoriety in 1991, however, when—no longer powerful—she published her no-holds-barred memoir You'll Never Eat Lunch in This Town Again, which viciously blasted both the movie business and many Hollywood personalities. Phillips was educated at Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, Mass. (B.A., 1965), and worked in publishing before becoming (1969) a story editor for Paramount Pictures in New York City. She went on to be head of Mirisch Productions and then a creative executive for First Artist Productions. Along with her husband, investment banker Michael Phillips, and actor Tony Bill, Phillips formed (1970) Bill/Phillips Productions and moved to Los Angeles. Their films included Steelyard Blues (1972), The Sting (1973), which won seven Oscars, Taxi Driver (1976), which won the Cannes Film Festival's Palme d'Or, and Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977). By this time, however, Phillips, who also had become president of her own company, Ruthless Productions, was suffering the effects of drug and alcohol dependency. Even though she underwent rehabilitation therapy, she was unable to regain her former status. Phillips followed her 1991 autobiography with a sequel, Driving Under the Affluence (1995), which was not well received, and, with Matt Drudge, was coauthor of Drudge Manifesto (2000).

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