Justin Lerner is the son of two developmental psychologists, one Catholic and one Jewish, who compromised by sending him to Quaker school in Pennsylvania until the age of eleven. He got his BA in Theatre Arts at Cornell University, graduating cum laude for his honors thesis on the films and philosophy of Russian director Andrei Tarkovsky.
After graduation, Justin spent a year in La Coruña, Spain teaching English as freelancing as a writer. He recently received his MFA in Directing at UCLA's Graduate Film School, where he has been awarded with the George Burns & Gracie Allen Fellowship, the Edie & Lew Wasserman Thesis Award, and the Deluxe Labs Thesis Award. His award-winning short film MAGGIE'S NOT HERE has played numerous festivals around the country, including Tribeca Underground Film Festival and LA Shorts Fest.
Justin's MFA thesis film, THE REPLACEMENT CHILD, made its festival World Premiere at the 2007 TELLURIDE FILM FESTIVAL. It has also been awarded by UCLA with the Director's Spotlight Award, a prize honoring the school's BEST OF 2007, as selected by a Blue Ribbon Panel of judges headed by Sundance Film Festival director Geoff Gilmore. Justin currently lives in Los Angeles.
To view a pdf of Justin's resume, click here.