Howard Bragman, one of Hollywood’s top crisis management experts whose clients included Sharon Osbourne, Monica Lewinsky, Stevie Wonder, Chaz Bono and many more, died peacefully in his sleep Saturday night after a private battle with acute monocytic leukemia. He was 66, just days shy of his 67th birthday.
Bragman graduated from the University of Michigan and immediately embarked on a career in public relations. He served as a VP in the Chicago and Los Angeles offices of Burson-Marsteller, then co-founded Bragman Nyman Cafarelli in 1989. That company was acquired by Interpublic Group in 2001, and Bragman went on to establish Fifteen Minutes, a media and public relations agency. He most recently founded LaBrea Media in 2018.
An LGBTQ+ activist and longtime community supporter, he advised several celebrities as a “coming out” counselor, including actress Meredith Baxter, basketball’s Sheyl Swoopes, country music artist Chely Wright, and NFL player Michael Sam.
Bragman was an Adjunct Professor in Public Relations at the USC Annenberg Center for Communications from 1998 to 2003, and the author of the book, Where’s My Fifteen Minutes?: Get Your Company, Your Cause, or Yourself the Recognition You Deserve, which was published in 2008 by Penguin.