The Criterion Collection (est. 1984) is a video-distribution company that sells "important classic and contemporary films" to film aficionados. The Criterion series is noted for helping to standardize the letterbox format for widescreen films, bonus features, and special editions for home video. Criterion is also known for making great efforts to restore and clean all films released on their label.

The Criterion Collection company was founded in 1984 by Robert Stein, Aleen Stein, and Joe Medjuck, who later were joined by Roger Smith. In 1985, the Steins, William Becker, and Jonathan B. Turell founded the Voyager Company, to publish educational multimedia CD-ROMs (1989–2000), during which time, The Criterion Collection became a subordinate division of the Voyager Company. In March 1994, Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holtzbrinck GmbH bought 20 percent of Voyager for US$ 6.7 million; the 4 founders each retained a 20 percent owner’s share.

In 1997, the Voyager Company was dissolved (Aleen Stein founded the Organa LLC CD-ROM publishing company), and Holtzbrinck Publishers sold the “Voyager” brand name, 42 CD-ROM titles, the Voyager web site, and associated assets, to Learn Technologies Interactive, LLC (LTI). Robert Stein sold 42 Voyager titles to LTI from his Voyager–Criterion company share. The remaining 3 partners, Aleen Stein, William Becker (President) and Jonathan Turell (CEO) owned The Criterion Collection company, which has a business partnership with Janus Films, and had one with Home Vision Entertainment (HVE) until 2005, when Image Entertainment bought HVE.

Alexander Rae "Alec" Baldwin III (born April 3, 1958) is an American actor who has appeared on film, stage, and television.

Baldwin first gained recognition through television for his work, for two seasons (6 and 7), on the soap opera Knots Landing, in the role of Joshua Rush. He has since played both leading and supporting roles in films such as Beetlejuice (1988), The Hunt for Red October (1990), The Marrying Man (1991), The Shadow (1994), Notting Hill (1999), The Aviator (2004) and The Departed (2006). His performance in the 2003 film The Cooler garnered him a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

Since 2006 he has starred as Jack Donaghy on the NBC sitcom 30 Rock, receiving critical acclaim for his performance and winning two Emmy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards, and seven Screen Actors Guild Awards for his work on the show, making him the male performer with most SAG Awards ever.

He is the eldest of the Baldwin brothers working in Hollywood.

Baldwin was born on Long Island, New York, the son of Carolyn Newcomb (née Martineau) and Alexander Rae Baldwin, Jr., a high school history/social studies teacher and football coach. Baldwin was raised in a Roman Catholic family of Irish, English, and French descent. He has three younger brothers, Daniel, William, and Stephen, who also became actors. Baldwin has two sisters, Beth Baldwin Keuchler (born 1955), and Jane Baldwin Sasso (born 1965).^{[citation needed]}

Guillermo del Toro (Spanish pronunciation: [ɡiˈʎermo ðel ˈtoɾo]; born October 9, 1964) is a Mexican director, producer, screenwriter, novelist and designer. He is mostly known for his acclaimed films, Blade II, Pan's Labyrinth and the Hellboy film franchise. He is a frequent collaborator with Ron Perlman, Federico Luppi and Doug Jones. His films draw heavily on sources as diverse as weird fiction, fantasy and war.

Del Toro was born in Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico. He was raised in a strict Catholic household. Del Toro studied at the Centro de Investigación y Estudios Cinematográficos, in Guadalajara. He first got involved in filmmaking when he was about eight years old and studied special effects and make-up with SFX artist Dick Smith. Del Toro participated in the cult series La Hora Marcada with other renowned Mexican filmmakers such as Emmanuel Lubezki and Alfonso Cuarón.

He spent ten years as a special effects make-up designer and formed his own company, Necropia. He also co-founded the Guadalajara International Film Festival. Later on in his directing career, he formed his own production company, the Tequila Gang.

Jack Garfein, born July 2, 1930, in Mukacevo, Carpathian Ruthenia, Czechoslovakia, now Mukacheve, Ukraine, is an acting teacher and former film and theater director.

Garfein was once married to actress Carroll Baker.

Garfein survived imprisonment at Auschwitz and came to the United States at the end of World War II.

He took classes in acting at the Dramatic Workshop of The New School in New York with the influential German director Erwin Piscator. He joined the Actors Studio and married his fellow student, actress Carroll Baker.

Baker and Garfein had one daughter, actress Blanche Baker, and a son, Herschel Garfein.

Garfein made his Broadway debut as a director with End as a Man starring Ben Gazzara. Notably Garfein produced two plays by Arthur Miller, The Price and The American Clock, and went on to direct other Broadway productions such as The Shadow of a Gunman, The Sin of Pat Muldoon, and Girls of Summer.^{[citation needed]} His Off-Broadway credits include The Lesson and Rommel’s Garden. He directed the French premiere of Master Harold...and the Boys in Paris, and the world premiere of Nacht und Träume by Samuel Beckett in Austria.^{[citation needed]}

Nicolas Winding Refn (born 29 September 1970) is a Danish film director, screenwriter and producer. Winding Refn moved to the United States in 1981 and graduated from the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in 1993. He is famous for directing the Pusher trilogy. His film Drive premiered in competition at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival where it won him the Best Director Award.

Winding Refn was born in Copenhagen and raised partly in New York. He is married to actress Liv Corfixen, with whom he has two children. His parents are Danish film director and editor Anders Refn and cinematographer Vibeke Winding. His half-brother is Danish singer Kasper Winding.