Michael Moore Biography

Fast Facts

• Briefly enrolled in a Roman Catholic seminary when he was 14
• At 18, became one of the youngest publicly elected officials in U
• S
• history when he won a seat on the Flint, MI, school board
• In 1976, founded both a crisis-intervention center and an alternative newspaper, The Flint Voice, which later became The Michigan Voice
• Started his own production company, Dog Eat Dog Films, in 1986; three years later, made his feature-film debut with the acclaimed documentary Roger and Me
• In the mid-'90s, created the series TV Nation, an irreverent newsmagazine for which Moore served as writer, director and correspondent; it ran for a few episodes on NBC in 1994, then was briefly revived by Fox the following year
• Returned to the public eye in 2002 with Bowling for Columbine, an examination of gun-control laws in the wake of the 1999 Columbine High School shootings
• Courted controversy with 2004's Fahrenheit 9/11, which criticized the Bush administration's policies following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks; it became the highest-grossing documentary ever, taking in nearly $120 million in the U
• S
• alone
• Ran afoul of the U
• S
• Treasury Department over a possible trade-embargo violation when he traveled to Cuba to shoot scenes for Sicko (2007), a biting critique of the American health-care system
• Has written several politically oriented books, including Downsize This! Random Threats from an Unarmed American (1998), Stupid White Men
• and Other Sorry Excuses for the State of the Nation! (2002) and Dude, Where's My Country? (2003)
• Took a critical look at the late-2000s financial crisis with Capitalism: A Love Story (2009)