# Steven Haft

Steven Haft is an American media executive, attorney and film producer.

## Biography

Haft was born in Manhattan and raised in Flushing, Queens, the son of Helen (née Urdang) and Nathan "Nuddy" Haft. He is a graduate of Hofstra University School of Law and is a member of the bar of the U. S. Supreme Court. After studying, Haft produced films for over 20 years including Jakob the Liar and Dead Poets Society.
In 2000, he accepted a position with AOL as vice president and chief strategy officer for its $1.2 billion in sales Interactive Marketing Group. He left AOL to found the media consultancy company Indyworks, which focuses on the impact of emerging technologies on media. His clients included Comcast Cable, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the College Television Network, AirMedia, Edelman and Burson-Marstellar. He is the senior vice president of innovation for the magazine publisher Time Inc.

## Philanthropy and civic service

Haft has been involved in environmental issues, human rights and arts in education since the 1970s. He sat on the board of United States' variant of the TerraMar Project, which was a United Nations NGO that promoted the Clean Oceans provision of the Sustainable Development Goals program, until TerraMar (US) announced that it had ended operations on July 12, 2019, after the sex trafficking charges against Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell, became public.
Haft is an advisory board member of the Global Partnerships Forum, which acts as an intermediary linking business entities, government agencies and the United Nations to develop shared goals and efforts. He is an elected member of the Motion Picture Academy and a trustee emeritus of Robert Redford's Sundance Institute and was appointed by the New York mayor, Michael Bloomberg, to the board of the Brooklyn Navy Yard Corporation. He is vice chair of the Presidential Scholars Foundation, is a STEM advisor to the Center for the Study of The Presidency & Congress and has done work for the John D. Rockefeller III Fund, the John Hay Whitney Foundation, the United Automobile Workers and the American Civil Liberties Union. He was a co-founder of the original Earth Day in 1970.

## Personal life

He is divorced from the author Lisa Birnbach; they have three children. He attended the Modern Orthodox Jewish synagogue Congregation Kehilath Jeshurun in Manhattan.

## Filmography

He was a producer in all films unless otherwise noted.

### Film

| Year | Film | Credit |
| 1987 | Beyond Therapy | |
| 1988 | Mr. North | |
| 1989 | Dead Poets Society | |
| 1993 | Hocus Pocus | |
| 1996 | Last Dance | |
| 1996 | Emma | |
| 1999 | The Third Miracle | |
| 1999 | Jakob the Liar | |
| 1999 | The Bumblebee Flies Anyway | |
| 2000 | Beautiful Joe | |
| 2000 | Tigerland | |
| 2003 | The Singing Detective | |
| 2004 | Eulogy | |
| 2007 | Intervention | Executive producer |
| 2017 | Three Christs | Executive producer |
| 2022 | Hocus Pocus 2 | |

#### As writer

| Year | Film |
| 1996 | Last Dance |

### Television

| Year | Title | Credit | Notes |
| 1983 | Nightcap | | |
| 1985 | The Recovery Room | Executive producer | Television pilot |
| 1992 | Stormy Weathers | Executive producer | Television film |
| 1992 | American Playhouse | Executive producer | |
| 1994 | The Spider and the Fly | Executive producer | Television film |
| 1995 | The Courtyard | Executive producer | Television film |
| 1996 | The Ultimate Lie | Executive producer | Television film |
| 1997 | A Match Made in Heaven | Executive producer | Television film |
| 1998 | Rear Window | Executive producer | Television film |
| 1999 | Pirates of Silicon Valley | Executive producer | Television film |
| 1999 | Strange Justice | Executive producer | Television film |
| 2001 | America Undercover | Executive producer | Documentary |
| 2001 | No Ordinary Baby | Executive producer | Television film |
| 2002 | Warning: Parental Advisory | Executive producer | Television film |
| 2005 | Making Your Fortune Online with Marsha Collier | Executive producer | Documentary |
| 1995−2008 | Mad TV | Co-executive producer | |