HOWARD BALDWIN
Producer

HOWARD BALDWIN is President and CEO of the Baldwin Entertainment Group, a film entertainment company dedicated to creating and developing high-concept, quality, commercial films, providing expertise in all stages of development and production from concept to theatrical release.

Before forming BEG with Karen Baldwin, Howard Baldwin was president of Crusader Entertainment and partner of Philip Anschutz from 2000 to 2004, where he developed and produced an impressive slate of films including the action adventure Sahara, starring Matthew McConaughey and Penelope Cruz; Swimming Upstream, with Academy Award winner Geoffrey Rush and Academy nominee Judy Davis; Danny Deckchair, the 2003 Toronto Film Festival’s Closing Night Gala, starring Rhys Ifans and Miranda Otto; The Game of Their Lives, starring Wes Bentley and Gerard Butler, written and directed by David Ansapugh and Angelo Pizzo of Hoosiers and Rudy fame; and the critically acclaimed Ray, directed by Taylor Hackford, starring Jamie Foxx as legendary music icon Ray Charles.

From 1984 to 2000, Baldwin formed and ran Baldwin/Cohen Productions with partner Richard Cohen, producing a variety of films such as Sudden Death, Gideon, Resurrection and the Russell Crowe hockey drama Mystery, Alaska.

Prior to his film career, Baldwin was integral in the formation and ownership of numerous sports franchises. In 1971, at age 28, he started the Hartford Whalers WHA hockey franchise and later helped form Prism New England Sports Channel. Baldwin also co-brokered the historic merger of WHA with the National Hockey League. In the early 90s, he became Chairman of the Board and owner of two-time NHL Stanley Cup champions, the Pittsburgh Penguins and was concurrently the first American sports entrepreneur to break through the Iron Curtain to become 50% partners with the Russian government in ownership of the famous CCCP Red Army team in Moscow.

Equally notable for his diverse charitable activities, Baldwin was the driving force behind the Whalers’ award-winning community relations program. He established the Whalers Foundation for Giving and a Whalers Teaching Chair in Pediatric Oncology at the University of Connecticut Health Center, a $500,000 gift. He is presently partnered with Global Spectrum on the $217 million Iowa Events Centers under construction in downtown Des Moines, that will house his American Hockey League franchise.