Dan Mirvish is an American filmmaker and author, best known as the co-founder of the Slamdance Film Festival

Slamdance Film Festival

As a year-round organization, Slamdance serves as a showcase for the discovery of new and emerging talent in the film industry; it is also the only major film festival fully programmed by filmmakers. Slamdance counts among its alumni many notable writers and directors who first gained notice at the...

 and co-creator of the Martin Eisenstadt

Martin Eisenstadt

The Martin Eisenstadt hoax is an elaborate scheme of filmmakers Dan Mirvish and Eitan Gorlin that involved the creation of a fictional "talking head", Martin Eisenstadt, who was quoted by numerous major news outlets , as well as countless blogs, all of which failed to verify his actual existence...

 hoax during the 2008 Presidential election. In 2009, he co-authored the satirical novel I Am Martin Eisenstadt: One Man's (Wildly Inappropriate) Adventures with the Last Republicans published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Farrar, Straus and Giroux is an American book publishing company, founded in 1946 by Roger W. Straus, Jr. and John C. Farrar. Known primarily as Farrar, Straus in its first decade of existence, the company was renamed several times, including Farrar, Straus and Young and Farrar, Straus and Cudahy...

 ISBN 978-0865479142.

In 2004, Mirvish spearheaded the effort to get the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences to reactivate their Best Original Musical Oscar category. In a controversial move, the Academy canceled the category after Mirvish and others submitted the requisite number of films, including two by Mirvish.

Mirvish is widely credited as the discoverer of the Hathaway effect, which indicates that when actress Anne Hathaway

Anne Hathaway (actress)

Anne Jacqueline Hathaway is an American actress. After several stage roles, she appeared in the 1999 television series Get Real. She played Mia Thermopolis in The Princess Diaries...

 is in the news, the share price for Warren Buffett

Warren Buffett

Warren Edward Buffett is an American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist. He is widely regarded as one of the most successful investors in the world. Often introduced as "legendary investor, Warren Buffett", he is the primary shareholder, chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway. He is...

's Berkshire-Hathaway increases.

He was also a speechwriter for Senator Tom Harkin

Tom Harkin

Thomas Richard "Tom" Harkin is the junior United States Senator from Iowa and a member of the Democratic Party. He previously served in the United States House of Representatives ....

 of Iowa

Iowa

Iowa is a state located in the Midwestern United States, an area often referred to as the "American Heartland". It derives its name from the Ioway people, one of the many American Indian tribes that occupied the state at the time of European exploration. Iowa was a part of the French colony of New...

.

Mirvish's father, Dr. Sidney Mirvish, is a well-known cancer researcher at the University of Nebraska Medical Center.

Filmography

• Omaha (The Movie) (1994)
• Open House (2004)
• Half Empty (2006)
• A Message from the President of Iran (2006)
• Sheldon (2007)
• The Few & the Proud (2007)
• The Last Republican (2008)