Eli Roth

Eli Raphael Roth (born April 18, 1972) is an American film director, producer, writer and actor. He is known for directing the horror film Hostel and its sequel, Hostel: Part II. He is also known for his role as Donny "The Bear Jew" Donowitz in Quentin Tarantino's war film Inglourious Basterds for which he won both a SAG Award (Best Ensemble) and a BFCA Critic's Choice Award (Best Acting Ensemble). Journalists have included him in a group of filmmakers dubbed the Splat Pack for their explicitly violent and bloody horror films. In 2013, Roth received the Visionary Award for his contributions to horror, at the Stanley Film Festival.

Early life

Roth was born in Newton, Massachusetts, to Dr. Sheldon Roth, a psychiatrist/psychoanalyst and clinical professor at Harvard Medical School, and Cora Roth, a painter. Roth was raised Jewish (his family is from Austria, Hungary, Russia, and Poland). Besides English, he speaks French, Italian and Russian.

Roth began shooting films at the age of eight, after watching Ridley Scott's Alien (1979). He and his brothers Adam and Gabriel made over 100 short films before he graduated from Newton South High School and attended film school (the Tisch School of the Arts) at New York University. To fund his films while in college Roth worked as an online cybersex operator for Penthouse Magazine, posing as a woman, as well as a production assistant on feature films. Roth also ran the office of producer Frederick Zollo, leaving after graduation to devote himself to writing full-time. He collected unemployment and found work on Howard Stern's Private Parts as Stern's assistant, staying at Silvercup Studios in Queens at night working on his scripts while Stern slept.