Allan Loeb

Allan Loeb (born July 25, 1969) is an American screenwriter and film and television producer. He wrote the 2007 film Things We Lost in the Fire and created the 2008 television series New Amsterdam. He wrote the film drama 21, which also was released in 2008. Among his other credits, he wrote and produced The Switch. He also co-wrote Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps (2010), and wrote The Dilemma (2011), and Just Go with It (2011). He performed a rewrite for the musical Rock of Ages (2012), and the mixed martial arts comedy Here Comes the Boom (2012).

Life and career Loeb was born to a Jewish family in Highland Park, Illinois, dropping out to work at the Chicago Board of Trade. He relocated to Los Angeles, California in 1993 to pursue a career in screenwriting. In 2004, after graduating from the University of California, Los Angeles, he moved to New York to write the script for The Only Living Boy in New York, which was eventually made into a 2017 film. Loeb returned to Los Angeles and continued writing his script with the help of Little Miss Sunshine producers Albert Berger and Ron Yerxa. He also joined Gamblers Anonymous to address his gambling addiction, which he claims changed his writing for the better. Additionally Loeb co-wrote, along with Kevin James, the script to the mixed martial arts comedy Here Comes the Boom.

Loeb also rewrote the 2015 earthquake disaster 3D project San Andreas at New Line Cinema, and the action comedy The Machine, with Vin Diesel attached to produce and star at MGM.

In 2015, Allan Loeb's long-developing script Out of This World, a project he had been writing since 2007, finally moved forward. Retitled The Space Between Us, the film was released in 2017. He sold his spec script, Collateral Beauty (2016), to Palm Star Media, with Will Smith cast in the lead.

Personal life Loeb was a compulsive gambler from the age of ten until he joined Gamblers Anonymous in 2005, claiming: "Literally the minute I quit gambling my writing changed. It was magical. I had been giving so much emotional energy to gambling that only half of myself was out there writing. Gambling was a time suck, an energy suck, a creativity suck. I started going to GA meetings every Thursday night, and the writing flourished. It had so much more energy and passion." He was later able to escape gambling, and used his experience to advocate for legalization with guardrails. Loeb is a keen follower of rock band Grateful Dead, which he compares to the film industry in its fanbase.

Filmography