Martha Coolidge is a renowned director with a passion for telling good stories and a gift for working with, and discovering, talented actors. She has helmed a diverse range of independent and mainstream projects including comedy, drama and special effects films, and has worked with some of Hollywoods greatest stars, discovering talents like Nicolas Cage and Val Kilmer along the way.

Coolidge garnered a Directors Guild nomination and an Emmy nomination for her successful direction of the cable feature Introducing Dorothy Dandridge, which also earned eleven Emmy nominations, five Emmy Awards, a Golden Globe, the SAG Award and the NAACP Entertainer of the Year Award for its star, Halle Berry. Coolidge also received a Directors Guild nomination for her segment of the Emmy-nominated HBO movie If These Walls Could Talk 2 the acclaimed film that dramatized the progression of the acceptance of lesbianism. Great actors, complex layering and a careful use of the right music and score have marked Coolidges films right from the start. Her 1983 hit Valley Girl boasted a hugely popular soundtrack and introduced the untapped talent of Nicolas Cage in his first major film role, now released on DVD. Also among Coolidges many credits are the feature films Out to Sea, with an all-star cast including Jack Lemmon and Walter Matthau; Three Wishes, with Patrick Swayze and Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio; Lost In Yonkers, adapted by Neil Simon from his Pulitzer Prize-winning play; and Angie, starring Geena Davis. She also directed Rambling Rose, which earned Oscar nominations for its stars Laura Dern and Diane Ladd, and IFP Independent Spirit Awards for Best Director, Best Picture and Best Supporting Actress. This longtime project of Coolidge and Dern also starred Robert Duvall and Lukas Haas, and was written by Calder Willingham (The Graduate, Patton, Paths of Glory). Coolidges Crazy In Love, for TNT, garnered a Golden Globe nomination and an ACE Award for the films stars Holly Hunter and Herta Ware respectively; her comedy Real Genius introduced Val Kilmer and has become another cult classic.

Coolidge was awarded the prestigious Women in Film Crystal Award in honor of her film career. In addition, her election as the first woman president of the Directors Guild of America in its 66-year history is an acknowledgement of respect by her peers. She is also the recipient of the DGAs top award, the Robert B. Aldrich Award.

Coolidge started making films at the Rhode Island School of Design. She subsequently moved to New York where she continued her studies at the New York University Institute of Film and Television graduate school. Among her early credits are City Girl, executive-produced by Peter Bogdanovich; Plain Clothes, starring Arliss Howard; and Joy of Sex.

For television, Coolidges most recent credits include the PBS movie The Ponder Heart, with JoBeth Williams and Peter MacNicol; and the Hallmark production The Flamingo Rising, starring William Hurt and Elizabeth McGovern. She directed the pilots for the prime time drama series Leap Years and the cult hit series Sledge Hammer! as well as several episodes of the hugely popular series Sex and the City and Hidden Hills.

Born and raised in New Haven, Connecticut, the daughter of two architects and a relative of Calvin Coolidge, Coolidge believes in giving back. She is a member of the board of the American Film Institute, a trustee of her alma mater, the Rhode Island School of Design, and a member of the Deans Council for her graduate school, New York Universitys Tisch School of the Arts.

An avid horsewoman and breeder of smooth-gaited Paso Fino horses, Coolidge lives in Los Angeles with her son Preston, named in honor of her idol, director Preston Sturges.