Profile Text
Cronenberg in 2007, photo by Denis Makarenko /Bigstock.com
Birth Name: David Paul Cronenberg
Place of Birth: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Date of Birth: March 15, 1943
Ethnicity: Ashkenazi Jewish
David Cronenberg is a Canadian filmmaker, writer, and actor. He has directed the films Stereo , Crimes of the Future (1970), Shivers / They Came from Within , Rabid (1977), Fast Company , The Brood (1979), Scanners , Videodrome , The Dead Zone , The Fly (1986), Dead Ringers , Naked Lunch , M. Butterfly , Crash (1996), eXistenZ , Spider (2002), A History of Violence , Eastern Promises , A Dangerous Method , Cosmopolis (2012), Maps to the Stars , and Crimes of the Future (2022), and episodes of the shows Peep Show and Scales of Justice . He also wrote his first four films, as well as The Brood , Scanners , Videodrome , Naked Lunch , Crash , eXistenZ , Cosmopolis , and Crimes of the Future ; and co-wrote Fast Company , The Fly , and Dead Ringers . His acting roles include Clive Barker’s Nightbreed , Jason X , and Slasher season 4. He has been nicknamed “The Baron of Blood” and “King of Venereal Horror.”
He is the son of Esther (Sumberg), a musician, and Milton Cronenberg, a writer and editor. Milton was born in Baltimore, Maryland, and Esther was born in Toronto; all of his grandparents were from Lithuania.
David was married to film editor Carolyn Zeifman, until her death. He has a daughter with his former wife Margaret Hindson; and two children, writer and director Brandon Cronenberg and photographer and director Caitlin Cronenberg, with Carolyn.