Gary Barber

Barber was born to a Jewish family[2] in Johannesburg, South Africa.[3][4] He was educated at King David School, Linksfield, in Johannesburg. He then received an accounting degree from the University of the Witwatersrand, also in Johannesburg.[1][5] He later worked as a Chartered Accountant and Certified Public Accountant in South Africa and the United States, both with Price Waterhouse.[1]

In 1982, he won a trip to the Arlington Million horse race in Illinois.[5] In the same year, he moved to the United States, where his brother Cecil had been living since 1979. In the mid-1980s, Barber became a U.S. citizen.[3] In 1998, he and Roger Birnbaum founded Spyglass Entertainment in Los Angeles.[1] His highest-grossing film as producer was The Tourist (2010), which grossed close to US$280 million at the worldwide box office.[6]

In December 2010, Barber became Chief Executive Officer of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM).[1] Under his leadership, MGM together with Eon Productions and Sony Pictures financed the successful James Bond film Skyfall, which grossed US$1,1 billion. MGM then also financed The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012), 21 Jump Street (2012) and Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters (2013). MGM then moved forward with remakes of RoboCop and Poltergeist.[7][8] In March 2018, Barber was ousted from MGM, coming five months after the renewal of his contract with the studio to 2022; he received a $260M settlement.[9][10]

Barber has three daughters and lives in Los Angeles.[5]

• Gary Barber Bio
• Gary Barber at IMDb