Ratner got his start directing with music videos in the 1990s,[5] and directed his first motion picture, Money Talks, in 1997.[6] Overall, the films Ratner has directed have earned over $2 billion at the global box office.[5] Ratner is the co-founder of RatPac Entertainment, a film production company. Ratner led RatPac's partnership with Dune Entertainment in September 2013 for a co-producing deal with Warner Bros. that included 75 films.[7] RatPac Entertainment has co-financed 81 theatrically released motion pictures exceeding $17 billion in worldwide box office receipts. RatPac's co-financed films have been nominated for 59 Academy Awards, 25 Golden Globes and 43 BAFTAs and have won 25 Academy Awards, 8 Golden Globes and 24 BAFTAs. In January 2017, Ratner received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame for his contributions to the motion picture industry, located at 6801 Hollywood Boulevard.[8][9]
In 2017, numerous women in Hollywood came forward with allegations of misconduct against Ratner.[10]
Early life
Ratner was born and raised in Miami Beach, Florida, the son of Marsha Presman and Ronald Ratner.[11][12] He grew up in a middle-class Jewish family.[13] His grandfather was d-CON mail order rat poison company founder and real estate developer Lee Ratner.[14][15][16][17] His mother was born in Cuba and immigrated to the U.S. in the 1960s with her parents, Fanita and Mario Presman, whose families themselves originally moved to Cuba from Eastern Europe.[18][19][17] Ratner's mother was sixteen when he was born.[13] Ratner has said that he "really didn't know" his biological father, and that he considers Alvin Malnik, a lawyer and businessman with alleged organized crime ties[20][21][22] who opened the restaurant The Forge in Miami Beach, to be his father, "the one who raised" him.[23] Malnik was a friend of Lee Ratner and not romantically involved with Marsha Presman.[17] Ratner's biological father became homeless in Miami Beach, a situation which inspired Brett Ratner to become a board member of the nationwide nonprofit organization Chrysalis, which helps the homeless find work.[24]
Ratner began directing music videos in the 1990s.[5] When he was a sophomore at New York University Tisch Schools of the Arts, he was manager and executive producer for B.M.O.C. (Big Man On Campus), one of the first white rap groups.[29] While a student at NYU, he released his first short film Whatever Happened to Mason Reese?.[30] The rap group Public Enemy attended the film's premiere and asked Ratner to make the group's music videos.[5] Ratner did the debut videos for Prime Minister Pete Nice before working with Redman, LL Cool J, Heavy D and Wu-Tang Clan.[31] He has directed music videos for artists such as Mariah Carey[32]Madonna, Miley Cyrus,[33]Jay-Z[5] and was scheduled to direct a video for Michael Jackson before its production was cancelled.[34] He directed Carey's "We Belong Together", "I Still Believe", "Obsessed" and "Heartbreaker" and others.[35][36]
Ratner had his motion picture debut when he directed Money Talks in 1997. The film, an action-comedy about a con-man accused of organizing a prison break, was Ratner's first collaboration with comedian Chris Tucker. The film's budget was $25 million.[37]
In 1998, he directed Rush Hour, an action-comedy starring Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker, which was released in September 1998 and went on to become the studio's highest-grossing film and the highest grossing comedy at the time.[38][39] Ratner uses music on the set to inspire the production, and when filming Rush Hour, a Michael Jackson song he played for inspiration ended up in the film after Chris Tucker began dancing in the middle of a scene.[40]
Ratner directed a television commercial for Wynn Las Vegas featuring Steve Wynn on top of Encore Las Vegas in 2008.[50]
In the same year, Ratner directed the ensemble comedy caper Tower Heist, starring Ben Stiller and Eddie Murphy. The film was originally based on an idea from Eddie Murphy titled 'Trump Heist' and was about disgruntled employees of Donald Trump planning to rob Trump Tower, though references to Trump were removed from the film.[51][52]
In early 2021, Ratner announced that he will direct a long-gestated Milli Vanilli biopic, which would be his first project since Paramount's 2014 film Hercules for Millennium Media. In February 2021, Millennium Media stated it would not be moving forward with Ratner's project.[53]
In January 2025, Amazon confirmed that its Prime Video has exclusively licensed an upcoming documentary film on incoming First Lady Melania Trump that will be directed by Ratner. With both a theatrical and streaming release, Melania Trump will also be an executive producer. Filming started in December 2024, one month after Donald Trump won the presidential elections.[54]
Producing
Ratner was an executive producer of the television series Prison Break, which aired from 2005 to 2009,[55] and directed its pilot episode.[56]
In 2011, Ratner produced the TV documentary, American Masters: Woody Allen – A Documentary.[57] That same year, he produced Horrible Bosses, a comedy about employees plotting to kill their bosses.[58][59]Horrible Bosses opened at the domestic box office with $28.1 million in its first weekend.[60]
Ratner produced a remake of Snow White, Mirror Mirror (2012), based on the screenplay The Brothers Grimm: Snow White by Melisa Wallack.[61]
In December 2012, Ratner and Australian media mogul James Packer formed a joint venture, RatPac Entertainment. The firm will produce independent films and co-produce big-budget films with a major studio.[69] Packer's stake in the company was later bought out by Len Blavatnik's First Access Entertainment. The company makes 25 films annually.[70] By 2017, the company co-financed over 50 films which had 51 Oscar nominations and earned a total of over $10 billion in box office.[71]
RatPac and Dune Entertainment formed a film investment vehicle, which in September 2013, entered a multi-year, 75-film co-producing partnership with Warner Bros.[72] The company has partnered with New Regency, advertising firm WPP, CMC Capital Partners, and Shanghai Media Group.[73] Ratner worked with CMC to form a fund aimed at investments in Chinese media companies.[74]
Ratner made $40 million after the release of Gravity, which was RatPac's first investment.[75][76][77]
In June 2014, Ratner's RatPac Entertainment and Class 5 Films acquired the film rights to the non-fiction article "American Hippopotamus", by Jon Mooallem, about the meat shortage in the U.S. in 1910 to import hippopotamuses. The film was produced by Ratner in collaboration with Edward Norton and William Migliore.[78]
On April 18, 2017, Access Entertainment, a subsidiary of Access Industries, acquired James Packer's ownership stake in RatPac.[79] The next year, Warner Bros. announced that they were cutting ties with the company after Brett Ratner's sexual harassment allegations with Rampage as the final film to be co-financed by the company with Warner Bros., and the final film produced by RatPac overall.[80] In November 2018, RatPac-Dune's minority ownership stake in a library of 76 Warner Bros. films was put up for sale, with investors in the fund backing the library to cash out.[81] Vine Alternative Investments made a high bid for the library, but in January 2019, Warner Bros. exercised their rights to match the bid for the library and essentially acquired RatPac-Dune's stakes. The cost was estimated at nearly $300 million.[82]
Screen appearances
Ratner appeared on the MTV series Punk'd when Hugh Jackman, who portrays Wolverine in the X-Men films, was the subject of a practical joke that made it appear Ratner's $3.6 million home in Beverly Hills was destroyed by a BBQ grill explosion. Ashton Kutcher later arrived at his home and hugged him.[83]
He appeared as himself in an episode of the television series Entourage, which was shot at his Beverly Hills home,[85]
In 2009, Ratner created The Shooter Series which compiled his work, including interviews with Ratner, and a short film about Mickey Rourke's transition into boxing.[86]
Other projects
In 2009, Ratner established Rat Press, a publishing company. The company reissued a Playboy interview with Marlon Brando and Robert Evans as well as an account of NFL player Jim Brown,[87] and released a book of Scott Caan's photographs.[88]
In 2011, Ratner established Rat TV with 20th Century Fox Television. He brought former NBC development executive Chris Conti on as president of the venture.[89]
Ratner announced the Brett Ratner Florida Student Filmmaker Scholarship at the Key West Film Festival in 2015. The $5,000 scholarship was awarded to The Cook, The Knife and The Rabbit's Finger, which was directed by Agustina Bonventura and Nicolas Casanas.[99]
Ratner worked with international beverage brand Diageo to produce The Hilhaven Lodge, a blended whiskey named for his Beverly Hills estate.[100] The bottle is modeled after the estate and features a wood cork, and the bottle is shaped to resemble bay windows.[101] The drink is a mixture of 26-year-old rye, 15-year-old Tennessee whiskey, and six-year bourbon.[102]
Ratner delivered a keynote address as part of the Cannes Film Festival in May 2017 where he referred to television as the future of production.[103] Ratner participated in the eighth annual Cannes Film Finance Forum.[104]
In March 2017, Ratner spoke out against film critic aggregation site Rotten Tomatoes at the Sun Valley Film Festival, calling it a destructive force in the film industry. He expressed respect for traditional film critics and said the site reduces film criticism to a number.[105]
In October 2017, during the Me Too movement, a former talent agency employee accused Ratner of rape.[112] On November 1, 2017, six women, including Olivia Munn and Natasha Henstridge, accused Ratner of sexual assault and harassment, as well as following an actress into a bathroom without invitation and masturbating as another entered his trailer to deliver food.[113][114] The same month, Elliot Page accused Ratner of sexual harassment and outing the then-18-year-old Page as gay (before Page came out as a trans man) in front of many onlookers including Anna Paquin, who later confirmed the story.[115] A former fashion model came forward regarding an incident involving Russell Simmons and Ratner back in 1991, when Simmons coerced her to perform oral sex while Ratner was present.[116]
On November 1, 2017, the same day as the allegations of six women, Warner Bros. announced it had severed ties with Ratner. Afterwards, Ratner announced that he was "[stepping] away from all Warner Bros.-related activities" and Warner Bros. was reviewing the issue.[117][118][119][120] In April 2018, Warner Bros. announced that they would not renew their $450-million co-producing deal with RatPac.[121]
^Colen, Dsvid (May 1, 2011). "20 Good Questions with Brett Ratner". Aventura Business Monthly. Hallandale Beach, Florida: Stern Bloom Media. Archived from the original on September 4, 2011. Retrieved February 27, 2012.
