Kirkpatrick sold his first screenplay to Paramount at the age of 17 while still in high school and taught screenwriting at the California Institute of the Arts at the age of 18 where he received his bachelor's degree in 1974. Kirkpatrick's screenplay Dynamite Woman was produced in 1976 and distributed by New World Pictures. Shortly after, he took a position in the story department at Paramount Pictures. Kirkpatrick worked his way up the ranks at Paramount making his name by overseeing Paramount's exclusive development deal with Eddie Murphy. The arrangement resulted in several hits including the $234 million blockbusterBeverly Hills Cop. During his years at Paramount, Kirkpatrick oversaw the successful Indiana Jones and Star Trek franchises, box office hits such as Top Gun, Ghost, and The Hunt for Red October, and award-winning films such as Witness, Terms of Endearment, and Reds. Kirkpatrick worked under industry executives Barry Diller, Michael Eisner and Jeffrey Katzenberg at Paramount. Both Kirkpatrick and Katzenberg were involved in the development of Coming to America and the subsequent Buchwald v. Paramount breach of contract lawsuit. The case was the subject of the 1992 book Fatal Subtraction. Kirkpatrick was also instrumental in replacing Hunt for Red October star Alec Baldwin with Harrison Ford in the Jack Ryan franchise. Baldwin revealed this in a March 2011 column on The Huffington Post, in which he accused Kirkpatrick of back-handed dealings in the matter, referring to Kirkpatrick as "a beady-eyed, untalented tool".
Disney and Touchstone
From 1987 to 1989, Kirkpatrick became the chief of production at Walt Disney Pictures and Touchstone Pictures becoming the first motion picture executive to hold that position at two studios at the same time. During that period, he oversaw The Little Mermaid, Pretty Woman and Dead Poets Society among other films, before returning to Paramount.
Original Voices
Kirkpatrick left his post at Paramount after finding his office furniture on the lawn after an altercation with fellow executive Stanley R. Jaffe. Afterward, he entered into a production deal with the company and then produced The Brady Bunch Movie, and The Evening Star, a sequel to Terms of Endearment. He then formed his own production company Original Voices concentrating on smaller budget projects, producing the independent hits Big Night and The Opposite of Sex, with Rysher Entertainment.
Good News Holdings
In 2006, Kirkpatrick co-founded Good New Holdings, a faith-based entertainment company that produced "spiritainment". The company and Kirkpatrick were featured in a The New York Times profile, "A Once-Feared Kingmaker Called to a Different Battle" in December 2006. The title of the profile refers to the battle outlined in Ephesians 6:12 regarding the struggle over souls. In 2012, David Kirkpatrick lost a $2.3 million civil lawsuit brought by an investor against Kirkpatrick and Good News Holdings. According to the jury's ruling, Kirkpatrick and Good News Holdings had "made intentional misrepresentations, intentionally concealed material information, violated state securities laws and breached their fiduciary duties."
After leaving Good News Holdings, Kirkpatrick co-founded Plymouth Rock Studios, a planned $500 million film and television studio that was scheduled to open in 2012 in Plymouth, Massachusetts. Other executives involved included Earl Lestz, former President of Paramount Studio Groups for 21 years, real estate developer Bill Wynne, who built Rancho Santa Margarita, and Joe DiLorenzo, former CFO of the Boston Celtics and current Chairman of the Financial Executives International organization. In November 2009, the Studio had announced that it had secured $500 million in financing. The financing eventually fell through. Kirkpatrick and Plymouth Rock Studios parted ways in June 2010.
