He was also a professor emeritus at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, where he taught history and digital media.

[1] A graduate of Manhattan's Stuyvesant High School, he also earned bachelor's and master's degrees in history from the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

Landau authored 14 books,[4] produced and directed over 50 documentary films,[5] and wrote editorial columns[6] including for the Huffington Post.

[11] He received an Emmy for his film Paul Jacobs and the Nuclear Gang (1980), which he co-directed with Jack Willis, with cinematography by Academy Award-winning filmmaker Haskell Wexler.

[12] He won the Edgar Allan Poe Award 1981 for "Best Fact Crime"[13] for Assassination on Embassy Row (with John Dinges; Pantheon 1980) about the murder of TNI Director Orlando Letelier and their colleague and friend Ronnie Karpen-Moffitt.