Sidney Kimmel

Key takeaways

Sidney Kimmel belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Sidney Kimmel to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Sidney Kimmel from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Sidney J. Kimmel (born January 16, 1928) is an American businessman, philanthropist, and film producer. He is ranked 2141st in the Forbes list of the richest people alive in 2021.

Personal life Kimmel was born into a Jewish family in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the son of a cab driver. He attended Temple University, but did not graduate. He now lives in California with his wife Caroline Davis, the former wife of Leonard Tose. Kimmel is featured on Old Jews Telling Jokes. Kimmel and his wife bought Johnny Carson's former estate, a property that sits on the Point Dume promontory in Malibu, California, in 2007 for $46 million. In 2017, they placed the property on the market for $81.5 million. They reduced the price to $65.2 million in August 2018.

Career Kimmel founded Jones Apparel Group in 1970 while working at W. R. Grace and Company. Five years later, he purchased Jones Apparel Group with a partner. Notable lines produced by Kimmel include Jones New York, Evan-Picone, and 9 West; he also has licensing deals with Ralph Lauren. He stepped down as chief executive officer of Jones in 2002 and sold most of his shares in the publicly traded company, but remained chairman of the board of directors until the sale of the company to Sycamore Partners in 2014. Kimmel funded the erotic drama 9½ Weeks. He owns art, real estate, a film production company Sidney Kimmel Entertainment, and a small stake in the professional NBA basketball team Miami Heat.

Sidney Kimmel Entertainment Founded in 2004, Sidney Kimmel Entertainment (SKE) is a Los Angeles-based production, finance and distribution company headed by Kimmel. Films produced include SKE and Screen Gems' 2010 remake Death at a Funeral (2010 film), The Kite Runner (2007), United 93, Breach, Lars and the Real Girl, Adventureland, Synecdoche, New York, Gone (2012), The Place Beyond the Pines (2012) and The Age of Adaline.

Philanthropy Kimmel is an active philanthropist with an emphasis on healthcare, education, arts and culture. His goal is to donate $1 billion in total throughout his lifetime. In 1993, Kimmel founded the Sidney Kimmel Foundation. The foundation's Cancer Research division pledged to contribute $120 million to institutions serving healthcare, education, arts and culture. Later, in 2001, the Sidney Kimmel Foundation for Cancer Research donated $150 million to Johns Hopkins University. The donation became the largest single gift ever received by the University, and was directed toward the development of a residence for cancer patients undergoing extended treatment. The gift inspired the university to name the residence the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center. In total Kimmel has his name attached to four separate cancer-research centers in Philadelphia, New York, San Diego and Baltimore. The Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins Hospital as well as the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at Thomas Jefferson University carry his name. The Jefferson Medical College was renamed the Sidney Kimmel Medical College of Thomas Jefferson University in June 2014, following a $110 million grant from the Sidney Kimmel Foundation, the fifth-largest ever gift to a medical school. As of April 2003, Kimmel and the Sidney Kimmel Foundation had donated an estimated $400 million. Kimmel has also contributed over $35 million to the center for the performing arts in Philadelphia, which is now named The Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts and is home to the world-renowned Philadelphia Orchestra. Other contributions from Kimmel include a $5 million donation to The National Constitution Center in Philadelphia; a $20 million donation to Raymond and Ruth Perelman Jewish Day School in Philadelphia and $25 million for the establishment of a new prostate and urological cancer center at Memorial Sloan-Kettering in New York. In 2003 Kimmel pledged $25 million to The National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia. The construction was said to have cost in total $100 million, and opened in 2006 on the museum's existing site facing Independence Mall. Kimmel donated $25 million to Stand Up To Cancer. In 2025, Kimmel and his wife contributed 27.5 million to support the soon-to-be-constructed Caroline Kimmel Pavilion for Arts and Communication at Temple University. This is the second largest gift in the university's history, and the new building will serve as the new home for Temple's Klein College of Media and Communication and the Center for the Performing and Cinematic Arts. It is set to open in the fall of 2027.

Support for cold fusion research Kimmel has given $5.5 million to the University of Missouri to create the Sidney Kimmel Institute for Nuclear Renaissance, SKINR, where researchers will "figure out why excess heat has been observed when hydrogen or deuterium interacts with materials such as palladium, nickel or platinum under extreme conditions.", Originally named "cold fusion," nowadays the name low-energy nuclear reaction (LENR) is also used.

Filmography Producer

Executive producer

Presenter

References

External links Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center Sidney Kimmel at IMDb Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts Sidney Kimmel Cancer Research Endowments

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Sidney Kimmel

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Sidney Kimmel claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Sidney Kimmel before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Sidney Kimmel ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Sidney Kimmel

In research: Sidney Kimmel appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Sidney Kimmel in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Sidney Kimmel is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1928 births, 21st-century American Jews, 21st-century American philanthropists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Sidney Kimmel outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

How to study Sidney Kimmel in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Sidney Kimmel means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Sidney Kimmel out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Sidney Kimmel in simple terms?

Sidney J. Kimmel (born January 16, 1928) is an American businessman, philanthropist, and film producer.

Why does Sidney Kimmel matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Sidney Kimmel?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Sidney Kimmel.