A native of Chicago, ROBERT TEITEL has been associated with Tillman since they were students together at Columbia College in Chicago. There, Teitel produced the award-winning, 30-minute student film "Paula," directed by Tillman. With this, their first project together, Teitel and Tillman made a strong impact on the motion picture scene: "Paula" received the Midwestern Student Academy Award before going on to win additional prizes at seven student film festivals, including the Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame Award.
Following the success of "Paula," Teitel and Tillman raised money through a group of Chicago investors (including local doctors, lawyers and even blue-collar workers) to finance their next motion picture project, "Scenes From the Soul," which Teitel produced and Tillman directed.
Teitel produced "Soul Food," written and directed by George Tillman, Jr. On a sparse budget of $7.5 million, Soul Food managed to astound the film community by surpassing all expectations and pulling in $43 million. The soundtrack shipped double platinum and when the film went on sale in video, it was in the top 10.
Upon the release of the film, the partners signed a two-year, first look production deal with Fox 2000 Pictures, which enables them to develop projects for Teitel to produce and Tillman to produce and direct. Their company, State Street Pictures, has several feature film projects in development: an adaptation of the book Friends & Lovers, which will be produced independently; "Barbershop," a comedy that takes place in a barbershop in South Central; "Thirty Under 30," a thriller set up at Fox 2000 Pictures, involving young twenty-somethingÕs that get caught up in their own webs of greed, glamour, death, and jealously; "Bunny & Clyde," a drama about the loss of innocence and love on the streets of Hollywood; "Relative Stranger," a drama about a family torn apart when an estranged father decides to come back after being gone for six years; and an untitled love story that takes place at the Newport Jazz Festival in the 1960s.
