Introduction
Teaching Interests
Research Interests
Educational Background
Schedule

Ivan Cury
Professor

Office: 4260
Phone: 818-788-7025
FAX: 818-788-7021
Email: icury@calstatela.edu

INTRODUCTION

I’m a professor specializing in television production in the broadcasting program in the Department of Communication Studies. I started working in radio and television as a child actor in New York. (You can find out a little bit about that on-line at Bobby Benson Radio’s Cowboy Kid.) I received a BFA in theatre arts from Carnegie Mellon University, and an MFA from Boston University. After serving in the Army, I began teaching at Hunter College, and then worked at WNET in New York. I started as 3rd alternate make-up man and moved on to serve as stage manager, associate director, and finally became a staff producer-director. After 7 years at NET I left to go to CBS. Later, I moved to Los Angeles and as a freelancer, directed and/or produced a variety of programs, including The Young and The Restless, Nashville Remembers Elvis, Infatuation, etc. Since 1975 I’ve written, produced, directed, and or overseen post production for The Men’s Wearhouse commercials. While maintaining a career in television production, I have persued a parallel career, teaching at Hunter and Adelphi Colleges in New York, and then after moving to Los Angeles, taught for 11 years at UCLA. I have been at Cal State University, LA since 1990.

TEACHING INTERESTS

I m primarily interested in television broadcast production. Most of my production experience has been in multiple camera television, and I tend to teach classes which mirror the production techniques of the industry. Recently, a recent grad came back to school and visited my class.  After awhile he said: “I got to work at the station and found it was just like going to class.” Each quarter I have taught a “News Magazine” class and either a beginning or intermediate production class. 

In the beginning and intermediate class emphasis is placed on pre-production, and a clear practical understanding of the conventions associated with the requirements for each of the production’s positions. I.e. director, producer, associate director, cameras, audio...etc. This is done through production in a variety of formats, such as talk shows, demonstration shows, music videos and dramas. 

The news magazine class produces a kind of 60 Minutes magazine program about the arts and entertainment in our school, and local community. Each student produces a 2 to 5 mintue single camera production, which is then integrated into a 15 to 30 minute multiple camera program. This year I am looking forward to working with a select group of students on a new “remote” class which will produce programs on location. 

RESEARCH INTERESTS

PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES:  

There are four kinds of productions with which I have been associated: 

1. Panel/demonstration programs: I worked on hundreds of these at National Educational Television (NET), notably through School Television Service (STS), a few interview based series, such as Faces of Business USA, News Front, Interconnect, etc. and a number of public forum type programs such as Speak Out, The Candidates Tonight, etc. Additionally, I directed a number of series for CBS such as Woman! and a number of Sunrise Semester series. Violence In America was 3 hour prime time production for NBC. 

2. Music/Variety: Soul! @ NET (5 years of variety programs with soul artists such as Wilson Pickett, Carla Thomas, Joe Tex, The Unifics, Peaches and Herb, and jazz artists such as Thelonious Monk, Herbie Hancock, Rasann Roland Kirk, and others such as James Baldwin, Maya Angelou, Nikki Giovanni, etc. I also directed Nashville Big Event @ NBC: 2 two hour specials featuring an enormous variety of country music artists, as well as Nashville Remembers Elvis and a series of specials for Joe Cates Co. Aqui Y Ahora was an NET syndicated talk/variety series featuring poets such as Felipe Luciano and Victor Hernandez Cruz and the music of artists such as Tito Puente, Johnny Ventura and Olatunji. 

3. Dramas: Actor’s Choice, Watch Your Mouth! Up & Coming @ NET, The Doctors @ NBC, The Young & The Restless @ CBS 

4. Commercials: The Men’s Wearhouse, Oxwall Tools and hundreds of other commercials for New York based clients such as JGE Outlets, Bristol Clothiers, Price Beaters, Manor House, Kelley Brothers, etc. 

Additionally I am the author of Directing & Producing For Television, published by Focal Press.

EDUCATIONAL BACKGROUND

BFA Theatre Arts 1960
Boston University