A native of Montréal, growing up in New York, Ruddy attended Brooklyn Tech, earned a scholarship to City College of New York where he majored in chemical engineering. He graduated from the School of Architecture at the University of Southern California, and returned to the East to pursue a career in construction. A chance meeting with Jack L. Warner brought Ruddy back to Hollywood as a member of Warner Bros. where he was trained for an executive position. Ruddy then joined the Rand Corporation as a programmer trainee, becoming Rand's representative with the Air Force on the Design Change Acceptance Committee. He returned to show business as a writer for Universal's television department, and left this post when Marlon Brando hired him for his Pennebaker Productions as producer of WILD SEED (1965). Ruddy then formed Alfran. THE GODFATHER marked the third film produced by Ruddy under his own banner, Alfran Productions. Ruddy also produced MAKING IT (1971) for 20th Century-Fox and Paramount's LITTLE FAUSS AND BIG HALSY (1970). The producer, whose show business career had spanned a short but successful eight years, created the CBS television series "Hogan's Heroes" (1965). THE WILD SEED, a Universal film now in the film library of the Museum of Modern Art as an American film classic, was his first assignment as film producer. Other notable producing credits include THE LONGEST YARD (1974), THE CANNONBALL RUN (1981), DEATH HUNT (1981), MEGAFORCE (1982), LASSITER (1984), CANNONBALL RUN II (1984), LADYBUGS (1992), "Walker, Texas Ranger" (1993, TV series creator and exec. producer), BAD GIRLS (1994), the TV series "Flatland" (2002), THE LONGEST YARD (2005), CLOUD 9 (2006), CAMILLE (2007), and AIRBORN (planned for 2008).  Best Picture of the Year 1972: THE GODFATHER - Producer at Alfran  Best Picture of the Year 2004: MILLION DOLLAR BABY - Producer (w. Clint Eastwood & Tom Rosenberg) 2 nominations, 2 Awards