Ben Stein

"Win Ben Stein's ... Insight"

Tuesday, March 27, 2001
7:30 PM - Lee Chapel

Visit Ben Stein's Official Homepage

Ben Stein was born November 25, 1944 in Washington D.C.  He is the son of the economist and writer Herbert Stein.  He "grew up" in Silver Spring, Maryland and attended Montgomery Blair High School.  He graduated from Columbia University, in 1966 with honors in economics.  He graduated from Yale Law School in 1970 as valedictorian of his class by election of his classmates.  He helped to found the Journal of Law and Social Policy while at Yale.

He has worked as a poverty lawyer in New Haven and Washington, D.C. and a trial lawyer in the field of trade regulation at the Feeral Trad Commission in Washington, D.C.  He was a university adjunct at American University in Washington, D.C., at the University of California at Santa Cruz, and at Pepperdine University in Malibu, California.  At American University, he taught about the political and social content of mass culture.  He taught the same at UCSC, as well as about political and civil rights under the Constitution.  At Pepperdine, he taught about libel and securities law and ethical issues since 1986.

In 1973 and 1974, he was a speech writer and lawyer for Richard Nixon at The White House and then Gerald Ford.  (He did NOT write the line, "I am not a crook.")

He has been a columnist and editorial writer for the Wall Street Journal, a syndicated columnist for The Los Angeles Herald-Examiner (R.I.P.) and King Features Syndicate.  He is also a frequent contributor to Barron's where his articles about the ethics of management buyouts and issues of fraud in the Milken-Drexel junk bonds scheme drew major national attention.  he has been a regular columnist for Los Angeles Magazine, New York Magazine, E! Online, and most of all, has written a lengthy diary for ten years for The American Spectator.  He also writes frequently for The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal Op-ed, and almost every other imaginable magazine.

He has written and published fifteen books, seven novels, largely about life in Los Angeles and eight nonfiction books about finance and ethical and social issues in finance, and also about the political and social content of mass culture.  He has done promising work in concealed messages of TV and explaining how TV and movies get made.

His titles inlude, "A License to Steal - Michael Milken and the Conspiracy to Bilk the Nation," "The View from Sunset Boulevard," "Hollywood Days, Hollywood Nights," "DREEMZ," "Financial Passages," and "Ludes."

He has also been a longtime screenwriter, writing among many other scripts (most of which were never made) the first draft of "The Boost," a movie based on "Ludes" and the outlines of the lengthy miniseries "Amerika" and the acclaimed MOW, "Muder in Mississippi."

He was one of the creators of the well regarded comedy, "Fernwood Tonight."

He is also an extremely well known actor in movies, TV, and commercials.  His part of the boring teacher in Ferris Bueller's Day Off was recently ranked as one of the fifty most famous scenes in American film.  Starting in July of 1997, he has been the host of the Comedy Central quiz show, Win Ben Stein's Money.

He has now finished his book for Simon & Schuster's Free Press about his life with his ten year old son named Tommy & Me.  He lives with his wife, Alexandra Denman, his son, and every imaginable kind of pet and consumer good in Los Angeles.

This presentation  is generously supported by the Young America's Foundation.

This page is maintained by Contact Committee Vice Chair for Publicity Adam Allogramento.  Contact him by e-mail with questions or comments.