Debra Martin Chase: 'Tinsel Town's best-kept secret weapon'

Anonymity is not often associated with Hollywood. Egos can be as large as the movie screen on which films are displayed.

But for Debra Martin Chase, one of Hollywood's busiest and most successful personalities, anonymity--or near-anonymity--is just fine. The powers-that-be know that she has one of the town's best track records.

Movie fans may not be familiar with her name, but they certainly are familiar with the hit films she has produced or executive-produced. Her list of producer credits include the critical box-office hits Courage Under Fire, The Preacher's Wife, Devil in a Blue Dress and The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. She has also been in charge of production companies for major stars, including Whitney Houston and Denzel Washington.

When it comes to TV, Martin Chase has been just as successful. She is executive producer of the Lifetime Television series Missing, which stars Vivica A. Fox and Mark Consuelos. Additionally, she served as executive producer of The Cheetah Girls, one of the most successful Disney Channel original movies. That movie starred Raven-Symone, Sabrina Bryan, Adrienne Bailon, Kiely Williams and Lynn Whitfield. the ups and downs of four best friends strug to secure a record deal.

Martin Chase, born in suburban Chicago and raised in Southern California, has also produced the sequel to that movie, The Cheetah Girls 2, which will premiere during the Third Annual EBONY Presents Hollywood In Harlem event in New York in August. In the sequel, the four divas find themselves trying to make music in Barcelona, Spain.

Martin Chase Productions is now located at Disney, where she produced the hugely successful The Princess Diaries, a film that grossed more than $100 million in the United States alone. That level of success led to the production of the movie's sequel, The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement, which also was a major box-office hit.

On top of all that, she co-created and produced, BYOU, a teen workout DVD that is a dance fitness program for girls, combining pop and hip-hop movement.

Later this year, she is set to produce Fast Girls, a movie about a girls' track team. She also is producing, along with Queen Latifah and Shakim Compere, Just Wright, a romantic comedy that will also feature Queen Latifah in the lead rote.

A magna cum laude graduate of Mt. Holyoke College, Martin Chase attended Harvard Law School and worked for several major law firms and Fortune 500 companies in Houston and New York before she was attracted to the bright lights of Tinsel Town.

She serves on numerous boards and is a two-time Emmy Award nominee.

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