Born in Philadelphia, Shils became an integral part of the vibrant downtown New York City art scene in the late 70s and early 80s. A graduate of Yale University, Barry is the son of academic, Dr. Edward B. Shils a professor at the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania and Founder of the Wharton Entrepreneurial Center. Shils' grandparents on both sides were first generation Americans of Russian Jewish descent.
Career
Shils' films and videos from this period are part of the New York Museum of Modern Art collection. Inspired by the fertile Club 57 scene, titles include BEEHIVE, THE JONES, LOVE COMIX and LADY WRESTLING. Shils and his various collaborators: Steve Brown, Jim Self, Ellie Nagler and Frank Moore were honored by the screening of the films in the 2017-18 MoMA show “Club 57: Film, Performance, and Art from the East Village, 1978-1983.” Throughout the 80s and 90s, Shils was active in the independent film scene. In 1989 he produced Vampire's Kiss, a dark comedy written by Joseph Minion. The film stars Nicolas Cage and Jennifer Beals. He has been a member of the Directors Guild of America since 1998. Subsequently, Shils directed Motorama a surrealistic tale of a ten-year-old boy who drives a '65 Mustang across a fictional landscape. Motorama features Drew Barrymore, Flea, Jack Nance and Meat Loaf, with a soundtrack by Andy Summers of The Police. Distributed by Columbia-TriStar Home Entertainment, a division of SONY Pictures. Shils formed Goldstreet Pictures, producing and directing, a musical documentary chronicling the largest drag performance festival in the world at the time of the AIDS crisis. Starring Lady Bunny, RuPaul, Lypsinka, Alexis Arquette, Jackie Beat, Leigh Bowery, and featuring a cast of thousands in the audience - most of them in drag. Distributed by The Samuel Goldwyn Company and MGM Home Entertainment. Included in the collection of the UCLA Film Archive, Wigstock’s 20th Anniversary was celebrated by screenings at The Hammer Museum’s Billy Wilder Theater, the Museum of Modern Art and The Anthology Film Archives. Shils produced and directed ten episodes of HBO's reality series, America Undercover: Real Sex. Including "Ladies' Night" and "Doris Wishman: Queen of Sexploitation," a portrait of the trailblazing female film director. The Wishman piece is currently in development as a scripted feature film. Paralleling his entertainment-driven projects, Shils has produced and directed documentaries dealing with social issues. DOING JUSTICE, explores alternatives to incarceration for teenagers in the juvenile justice system. Narrated by Ellen Burstyn and broadcast on PBS. His most recent film, Generation A: Portraits of Autism and the Arts, focuses on young artists on the autism spectrum. Also featuring Temple Grandin, Stephen Shore and Joanne Lara. Generation A was broadcast on PBS throughout 2015 – 2017 and received the "Raising Autism Awareness Award" at The Golden DoorInternational Film Festival. Shils was Assistant Director, Production Manager and Associate Producer on five thrillers written, produced and directed by horror filmmaker Larry Cohen (including The Stuff with Michael Moriarity,, starring Karen Black and A Return to Salem's Lot.
