Julia Phillips

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title: "Julia Phillips" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["1944-births", "2002-deaths", "20th-century-american-jews", "20th-century-american-businesspeople", "20th-century-american-businesswomen", "20th-century-american-memoirists", "21st-century-american-jews", "american-people-of-polish-jewish-descent", "american-women-film-producers", "american-women-memoirists", "burials-at-hillside-memorial-park-cemetery", "businesspeople-from-new-york-city", "deaths-from-cancer-in-california", "film-producers-from-new-york-(state)", "jewish-american-memoirists", "jewish-american-film-people", "jewish-american-women-writers", "mount-holyoke-college-alumni", "people-from-great-neck,-new-york", "producers-who-won-the-best-picture-academy-award", "women's-firsts", "writers-from-brooklyn"] description: "American film producer" topic_path: "arts" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julia_Phillips" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary American film producer ::

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

Field	Value
name	Julia Phillips
birth_name	Julia Miller
image	JuliaPhillipsImg.jpg
caption	Phillips in 1991
birth_date
birth_place	New York City, U.S.
death_date
death_place	West Hollywood, California, U.S.
occupation	Film producer, author
spouse
children	1
::

| name = Julia Phillips | birth_name = Julia Miller | image = JuliaPhillipsImg.jpg | image_size = | caption = Phillips in 1991 | birth_date = | birth_place = New York City, U.S. | death_date = | death_place = West Hollywood, California, U.S. | occupation = Film producer, author | spouse = | children = 1 Julia Phillips (née Miller; April 7, 1944 – January 1, 2002) was an American film producer and author. She co-produced with her husband Michael (and others) three prominent films of the 1970s—The Sting, Taxi Driver, and Close Encounters of the Third Kind—and was the first female producer to win an Academy Award for Best Picture, received for The Sting.

In 1991, Phillips published an infamous tell-all memoir of her years as a Hollywood producer, titled You'll Never Eat Lunch in This Town Again, which became a bestseller.

Early life

Julia Miller was born on April 7, 1944 to a Polish-Jewish family in New York City, the daughter of Tanya and Adolph Miller.

Film career

In 1972, Phillips along with her husband Michael Phillips and producer Tony Bill commissioned David S. Ward to write the screenplay for The Sting, for $3,500. Phillips was also a notorious drug user (cocaine especially), which she chronicled in detail in her memoirs. The side-effects of cocaine addiction caused her to be fired from Close Encounters of the Third Kind during post-production. Periods of drug abuse, gratuitous spending and damaging boyfriends took their toll over the next few years.

Phillips's early work in a producing team with her husband continues to receive acclaim within the industry. Twenty-five years after its Oscar success, The Sting was inducted into the Producers Guild of America's Hall of Fame, granting each of its producers a Golden Laurel Award. In June 2007, Taxi Driver was ranked as the 52nd-best American feature film of all time by the American Film Institute. In December 2007, Close Encounters was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the United States Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry.

Publishing success

In 1991, Phillips published You'll Never Eat Lunch in This Town Again about her experiences in Hollywood. The book topped the New York Times bestseller list, but its revelations about high-profile film personalities, Hollywood's drug culture, and casting couch sensibilities drew ire from many former colleagues. Her follow-up book, Driving Under the Affluence, was released in 1995. It was mostly an account of how the success of her first book changed her life. In 2000, she helped Matt Drudge write his Drudge Manifesto.

Death

Phillips died from cancer at her home in West Hollywood, California, on January 1, 2002, at the age of 57, She had one daughter, Kate Phillips-Wiczyk, who is married to Modi Wiczyk, co-founder of independent film and television studio Media Rights Capital.

Filmography

She was a producer in all films unless otherwise noted.

Film

::data[format=table]

Year	Film	Credit	Notes
1973	Steelyard Blues
The Sting
1976	Taxi Driver
The Big Bus	Executive producer
1977	Close Encounters of the Third Kind
1987	The Beat
1988	The Boost	Executive producer
1991	Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead		Final film as a producer
::

;As an actress

::data[format=table]

Year	Film	Role	Notes
1977	New York, New York	Woman Flirting with Jimmy	Uncredited
Close Encounters of the Third Kind	UFO Watcher at Crescendo Summit
::

References

References

1. Weinraub, Bernard. (January 3, 2002). "Julia Phillips, 57, Producer Who Assailed Hollywood, Dies". [[New York Times]].
2. Sanello, Frank. (March 24, 1991). "Hollywood Story Of 'Highs' And Lows". [[Chicago Tribune]].
3. (January 27, 1975). "The Sting of Success". [[New York (magazine).
4. Child, Ben. (June 4, 2012). "How we made ... Michael Phillips and David S Ward on The Sting". [[Guardian News & Media Limited]].
5. Phillips, Julia. (1991). "You'll Never Eat Lunch in This Town Again". [[Random House]].
6. Morton, Ray. (2007). "Close Encounters of the Third Kind: The Making of Steven Spielberg's Classic Film". [[Applause Theater & Cinema Books]].
7. [[Producers Guild of America Awards 1997]]
8. (2007). "AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies -- 10th Anniversary Edition". [[AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition)]].
9. (December 27, 2007). "Librarian of Congress Announces National Film Registry Selections for 2007". [[Library of Congress]].
10. Matt Drudge and Julia Phillips. (2000). "Drudge Manifesto, Chapter one online". Denver Post.
11. Harris, Dana. (January 2, 2002). "Julia Phillips, producer, author, dies at age 57". [[Penske Business Media, LLC.]].
12. Meares, Hadley. (March 14, 2014). "Hillside Memorial Park: A Jewish Modernist Masterpiece in the Midst of the City". Public Media Group of Southern California.
13. Silverman, Stephen M.. (January 3, 2002). "Hollywood Iconoclast Phillips Dies". [[Meredith Corporation]].

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