Henry Bean

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title: "Henry Bean" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["1945-births", "living-people", "american-male-film-actors", "american-male-screenwriters", "male-actors-from-philadelphia", "film-directors-from-pennsylvania", "20th-century-american-male-actors", "21st-century-american-male-actors", "jewish-american-male-actors", "jewish-american-novelists", "screenwriters-from-pennsylvania", "21st-century-american-jews"] description: "American film director, actor" topic_path: "arts" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Bean" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary American film director, actor ::

::data[format=table title="Infobox person"]

Field	Value
name	Henry Bean
birth_date
birth_place	Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, US
occupation	{{flatlist
yearsactive	1977–present
children	2
::

| name = Henry Bean | birthname = | birth_date = | birth_place = Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, US | death_date = | death_place = | othername = | occupation = {{flatlist|

• Film actor
• director
• screenwriter | yearsactive = 1977–present | spouse = | partner = | children = 2 | parents = | website = Henry Bean (born August 3, 1945) is an American screenwriter, film director, film producer, novelist, and actor.

Best known as a screenwriter, Bean wrote the screenplays for Internal Affairs, Deep Cover, Venus Rising, The Believer, Basic Instinct 2, and Noise. Bean directed The Believer and Noise. He also acted in The Believer, and was a producer on Deep Cover and Noise.

Life

Bean was born in Philadelphia, to Fahnya (née Schorr) and Donald Bean (a lawyer). Bean is Jewish. He received a BA from Yale University in 1967; and a MA from Stanford University in 1973.

Career

Bean's 1983 novel False Match won a PEN Center USA award for "First Fiction".

The Believer was awarded the dramatic Grand Jury Prize at the 2001 Sundance Festival; the Golden St. George at the 23rd Moscow International Film Festival.; and Bean was named a "Breakthrough Director" at the Gotham Independent Film Awards in 2001.

Bean was the inspiration for the protagonist of Noise. He was so tired of constant noise around him and his home in New York City that he decided to take the law into his own hands. If a car alarm was going off and the owner of the vehicle didn't rectify the situation, Bean would break into the car to disable the offending car alarm. Bean was eventually arrested and jailed. He admits to doing it a few more times since.

Bean was a co-writer on two episodes in the second season of The OA.

Personal life

Bean married Nancy Eliason on January 3, 1968; they divorced February 14, 1970. He married screenwriter Leora Barish on March 23, 1980.

Filmography

::data[format=table]

Year	Title	Director	Writer	Producer	Notes
1983	Running Brave
1990	Internal Affairs
1992	Deep Cover
1995	Venus Rising
2001	The Believer				Role as "Ilio Manzetti"
2006	Basic Instinct 2
2007	Noise
::

References

References

1. (December 14, 2009). "Contemporary Theatre, Film and Television: Volume 53".
2. (February 25, 2002). "The Believer: Confronting Jewish Self-Hatred". [[Basic Books]].
3. (March 15, 2002). "A Question of Identity for the Man Behind 'The Believer'". [[Los Angeles Times]].
4. (1982). "False Match". [[Poseidon Press]].
5. "Past Winners". PEN America.
6. "23rd Moscow International Film Festival (2001)". [[Moscow International Film Festival.
7. (May 12, 2008). "The Unquiet Life".
8. (October 23, 2007). "Tim Robbins wages crusade against noise in new film". [[Reuters]].

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