Edward Burns

Edward Fitzgerald Burns is an American actor and filmmaker. He rose to fame with The Brothers McMullen, his low-budget independent film that became successful worldwide. His other film appearances include Saving Private Ryan, The Holiday, 27 Dresses, Man on a Ledge, Friends with Kids, and Alex Cross. Burns directed films such as She's the One, Sidewalks of New York, and The Fitzgerald Family Christmas. On television, he appeared as Bugsy Siegel in the TNT crime drama series Mob City and as Terry Muldoon in TNT's Public Morals.

Early life

Burns was born in Woodside, Queens, New York, the son of Edward J. Burns, a police officer and public relations spokesman, and Molly, a federal agency manager. He was raised a Roman Catholic. Burns is the second of three children and is of Irish and Swedish descent. He was raised in Valley Stream, New York, on Long Island. He briefly attended Chaminade High School before transferring to Hewlett High School. After high school, Burns attended SUNY Oneonta, the University at Albany, and Hunter College.

Career

Burns got his start in the movie industry right after college as a production assistant on the Oliver Stone movie The Doors. While working at Entertainment Tonight, he financed, produced, directed, and was featured in his first movie The Brothers McMullen in his spare time, which was largely filmed in his hometown of Valley Stream. Once he completed the movie, he was able to get a copy to Robert Redford after an ET junket interview for Quiz Show at the Rhiga Royal Hotel in Manhattan. In 1996, Burns wrote, directed, and was featured in the ensemble drama She's The One with Jennifer Aniston, Cameron Diaz and Amanda Peet, as well as in Sidewalks of New York in 2001.
Burns also appeared in the movies Saving Private Ryan, Life or Something Like It, and Confidence. Looking for Kitty, which Burns wrote, directed and starred in, was shot with a hand-held $3,000 digital Panasonic AG-DVX100 camera with a Mini35 adapter. The movie's entire budget was $200,000 and was filmed in New York City with a tiny crew and without standard permits. Burns discussed this unusual movie-making process in the director's commentary on the DVD and wrote in the Director's Letter "If you are an aspiring filmmaker, in this day of inflating budgets and runaway production, the truth is you can make a movie for no money in New York ... and have a blast".
His movie Purple Violets premiered exclusively on iTunes on November 20, 2007. Burns began a series of guest appearances on the HBO original series Entourage midway through season 3, as well as appearing as Grace Adler's boyfriend in Will & Grace. In Entourage, Burns plays himself and is writing a new television show in which Johnny Drama is able to acquire a part. In 2007, Burns announced plans to partner with Virgin Comics to create a series entitled Dock Walloper. Burns planned to use the comic series as a springboard to a movie of the same story.
In March 2009, a series of short movies called The Lynch Pin written and directed by Burns were released via the internet.
With the modest success of Purple Violets, Burns considered taking a studio directing assignment to make money. After reading scripts and attending meetings, he chose to remain an independent writer/director. Burns next wrote Nice Guy Johnny and filmed it quickly with the RED One camera for a reported $25,000 with a small crew. Nice Guy Johnny premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in 2010.
To coincide with the 10th anniversary of the Tribeca Film Festival in 2011, Burns wrote Newlyweds, which he also directed and starred in. Conforming to a model similar to Nice Guy Johnny, Newlyweds was filmed in 12 days for $9000 with a Canon 5D camera and an even smaller crew. The movie premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in 2011 as the final night movie. He claimed on Twitter that the $9,000 budget was "5k for actors, 2k insurance, 2k food and drink. 9k in the can." In 2013, Burns featured as real-life gangster Bugsy Siegel in Frank Darabont's miniseries Mob City.
In 2012, Burns set up a screenwriting contest with the web startup Scripped for a crowdsourced screenplay which he intended to help get produced.
In 2024, Burns began production in the Republic of Ireland on his golf-based film Finnegan's Foursome.

Personal life

Burns is married to model Christy Turlington and they have two children, a daughter born in 2003 and a son born in 2006. He and Turlington are Catholic. He is an advisor to ICX Media, an ad-tech audience analytics data company.

Filmography

Film

Acting roles

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1995	The Brothers McMullen	Finbar "Barry" McMullen
1996	She's the One	Mickey Fitzpatrick
1998	Saving Private Ryan	Private Richard Reiben
1998	No Looking Back	Charlie
2000	Shark Attack 2	Surfer Guy 2	Cameo; direct-to-video
2001	15 Minutes	Fire Marshal Jordan Warsaw
2001	Sidewalks of New York	Tommy Reilly
2002	Lethargy	Store Clerk	Short film
2002	Ash Wednesday	Francis Sullivan
2002	Life or Something Like It	Pete Scanlon
2003	Confidence	Jake Vig
2004	The Breakup Artist	Himself
2004	Looking for Kitty	Jack Stanton
2005	A Sound of Thunder	Travis Ryer
2005	The River King	Abel Grey
2006	The Groomsmen	Paulie
2006	The Holiday	Ethan Ebbers
2007	Purple Violets	Michael Murphy	Direct-to-iTunes
2008	One Missed Call	Detective Jack Andrews
2008	27 Dresses	George
2009	Echelon Conspiracy	John Reed
2010	Nice Guy Johnny	Uncle Terry
2011	Newlyweds	Buzzy
2011	Friends with Kids	Kurt
2012	Man on a Ledge	Jack Dougherty
2012	Alex Cross	Tommy Kane
2012	The Fitzgerald Family Christmas	Gerry
2018	Summer Days, Summer Nights	Jack Flynn
2019	Beneath the Blue Suburban Skies	Jim
2024	Millers in Marriage	Andy Miller
2025	The Family McMullen	Finbar "Barry" McMullen
TBA	Finnegan's Foursome	TBA

Television