He was born in New York City, the son of Lillian (née Baren) and Col. Edward Fisher Brown,[2][3] and was the elder brother of Carolyn Brown, who married French aristocrat Emmanuel de Crussol d'Uzès, Duke of Uzès,[4] then who remarried to Geoffrey Carpenter Doyle, a grandson of New York City architect James Edwin Ruthven Carpenter Jr.[5] Brown was a graduate of Stanford University and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

[6] He began his professional career as a journalist, contributing to magazines including The Saturday Evening Post, Harper's and Collier's, before becoming an editor himself.

He and Richard D. Zanuck, Darryl's son, left Fox in 1971 for Warner Bros., but the following year they set out to form their own production company.

Without Zanuck, Brown went on to produce films including the drama Angela's Ashes (1999) and the romance Chocolat (2000).

He bought the film and stage rights to the drama play A Few Good Men, written by playwright Aaron Sorkin.

Helen's maternal family cemetery is located just south of the village of Osage in Carroll County, Arkansas.