In 1999, screenwriter Charlie Kaufman went practically overnight from being just another former television writer trying to break into features to one the industry's hottest talents, all thanks to one film: Being John Malkovich. Being John Malkovich's surreal comic vision seemed to suggest an imagination that appeared practically out of nowhere, and in many ways that isn't far from the truth — despite his sudden success as a screenwriter, Kaufman has remained notoriously tight-lipped about his life and career, and consequently not a great deal is known about him. Charlie Kaufman was apparently born in late 1958, and raised on the East Coast; he spend his early years in Massapequa, Long Island, and attended junior high and high school in West Hartford, Connecticut, where his family moved in 1972. (Kaufman once told a journalist that he "grew up in the equivalent of Levittown, that kind of post-World War II development.") After graduating from high school in 1976, Kaufman briefly attended Boston University, but soon transferred to New York University, where he studied filmmaking. Kaufman made several short films at NYU and acting in student and community theater productions, but after graduating, Kaufman relocated to Minneapolis, where he worked in the circulation department of a newspaper, as well as a local art museum. In 1990, Kaufman…  » Read more