
Jim Abrahams
Writing
Biography
Jim Abrahams (May 10, 1944 – November 26, 2024) was an American movie director and writer. Abrahams was born in Shorewood, Wisconsin, to a Jewish family, and attended Shorewood High School. He was known for the spoof movies that he co-wrote and produced with brothers Jerry Zucker and David Zucker, such as Airplane! (for which he was nominated for a BAFTA Award for Best Screenplay) and The Naked Gun series. The team of Zucker, Abrahams and Zucker (also referred to as "ZAZ") really began when the three men grew up together in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Abrahams later produced movies on his own such as Big Business, and further honed his skills in parody with Hot Shots! and its 1993 sequel Hot Shots! Part Deux.
Known For

A fast-break series chronicling the professional and personal lives of the 1980s Los Angeles Lakers, one of sports’ most revered and dominant dynasties — a team that defined an era, both on and off the court.
Winning Time: The Rise of the Lakers Dynasty

Only one man has the particular set of skills... to lead Police Squad and save the world: Lt. Frank Drebin Jr. Following in his father's footsteps, he must solve a murder case to prevent Police Squad from closure.
The Naked Gun

Cindy finds out the house she lives in is haunted by a little boy and goes on a quest to find out who killed him and why. Also, Alien "Tr-iPods" are invading the world and she has to uncover the secret in order to stop them.
Scary Movie 4

An ex-fighter pilot forced to take over the controls of an airliner when the flight crew succumbs to food poisoning.
Airplane!

When the bumbling Lieutenant Frank Drebin investigates events following the shooting of his partner, he stumbles upon an attempt to assassinate Queen Elizabeth II.
The Naked Gun: From the Files of Police Squad!

An African prince decides it’s time for him to find a princess... and his mission leads him and his most loyal friend to Queens, New York. In disguise as an impoverished immigrant, the pampered prince quickly finds himself a new job, new friends, new digs, new enemies and lots of trouble.
Coming to America

In this cult parody of cop dramas, replete with farce and sight gags, Lieutenant Frank Drebin and his fellow officers from Police Squad bungle their way though crime investigations.
Police Squad!

The gang that created Airplane! and The Naked Gun sets its sights on Top Gun in this spoof. Topper Harley is a talented but unstable fighter pilot with an axe to grind: clearing the family name. His mission is to avenge his father and save a mission sabotaged by greedy weapons manufacturers. He also gets involved in a relationship with Ramada Thompson, a woman with an unusually talented stomach. Hot Shots! makes fun of a variety of other films, from Dances with Wolves to The Fabulous Baker Boys.
Hot Shots!

Frank Drebin is persuaded out of retirement to go undercover in a state prison. There he has to find out what top terrorist, Rocco, has planned for when he escapes. Adding to his problems, Frank's wife, Jane, is desperate for a baby.
Naked Gun 33⅓: The Final Insult

Popular and dashing American singer Nick Rivers travels to East Germany to perform in a music festival. When he loses his heart to the gorgeous Hillary Flammond, he finds himself caught up in an underground resistance movement. Rivers joins forces with Agent Cedric and Flammond to attempt the rescue of her father, Dr. Paul, from the Germans, who have captured the scientist in hopes of coercing him into building a new naval mine.
Top Secret!

Bumbling lieutenant Frank Drebin is out to foil the big boys in the energy industry, who intend to suppress technology that will put them out of business.
The Naked Gun 2½: The Smell of Fear

Topper Harley is found to be working as an odd-job-man in a monastery. The CIA want him to lead a rescue mission into Iraq, to rescue the last rescue team, who went in to rescue the last rescue team—who went in to rescue hostages left behind after Desert Storm.
Hot Shots! Part Deux

A prim and proper schoolgirl goes against her society grandmother's wishes when she dates a motorcycle-riding juvenile delinquent.
Cry-Baby

Angelo "Snaps" Provolone made his dying father a promise on his deathbed: he would leave the world of crime and become an honest businessman. Despite having no experience in making money in a legal fashion, Snaps sets about to keep his promise.
Oscar

Sam Stone hates his wife Barbara so much that he wants her dead. He's ecstatic when she's taken by a duo of kidnappers who want $500,000 ransom in exchange for her life. Fully intending to ignore every one of the kidnappers' demands in the hopes that they do him a favor and murder her for him, the two confused kidnappers have to figure out how they're going get their money, and what they're going to do with the overbearing Barbara.
Ruthless People

A middle-aged schoolteacher transforms into a 12-year-old boy at inopportune moments.
Big John, Little John

Movie star Roxy Carmichael is abandoning the bright lights of Hollywood, Calif. and returning to her small Ohio hometown -- at least long enough to dedicate a city building. And now the whole town of Clyde is bracing for Carmichael's return, most of all her now-married old flame Denton Webb and troubled teen Dinky Bossetti. An orphan with few friends, Dinky is convinced that Carmichael is her birth mother, and that the actress will reclaim her when she returns.
Welcome Home, Roxy Carmichael

After growing up poor in Salmonella, Vincenzo Cortino installs himself as the preeminent, if bumbling, Mafia don of the New World. But now he must pass on power to one of his two sons: either level-headed veteran Anthony or vituperative loose cannon Joey.
Jane Austen's Mafia!

A series of loosely connected skits that spoof news programs, commercials, porno films, kung-fu films, disaster films, blaxploitation films, spy films, mafia films, and the fear that somebody is watching you on the other side of the TV.
The Kentucky Fried Movie

In the 1940s in the small town of Jupiter Hollow, two sets of identical twins are born in the same hospital on the same night. One set to a poor local family and the other to a rich family just passing through. The dizzy nurse on duty accidentally mixes the twins unbeknown to the parents. Our story flashes forward to the 1980s where the mismatched sets of twins are about to cross paths.