Joel Schumacher - Biography

Joel T. Schumacher (born August 29, 1939) is an American film director, screenwriter and producer.

תוכן עניינים

1 Early life
2 Career
3 Sexuality
4 Recurring collaborators
5 Filmography
- 5.1 Director
6 External links

Early life

Schumacher was born in New York City, the son of Marian (née Kantor) and Francis Schumacher. His mother was a Swedish Jew, and his father was a Baptist from Knoxville, Tennessee, who died when Joel was four years old. Schumacher studied at Parsons The New School for Design and The Fashion Institute of Technology in New York. After first working in the fashion industry, he realized his true love was in filmmaking. He moved out to Los Angeles, where he began his media work as a costume designer in films such as Sleeper and developed his skills with television work while earning an MFA from UCLA. He wrote the screenplay for the 1976 low-budget hit movie Car Wash and a number of other minor successes. He also wrote 1978's The Wiz, an adaptation of the stage play of the same name. His film directorial debut was The Incredible Shrinking Woman in 1981, which starred Lily Tomlin, and he quickly made more successful films, including two "brat pack" works.

Career

The Brat Pack

St. Elmo's Fire and The Lost Boys, considered to be archetypal movies of the 1980s, were two of Schumacher's biggest hits. Their style impressed audiences and their financial success allowed studios to trust him with ever larger projects. He states in the director's commentary for St. Elmo's Fire that he resents the "Brat Pack" label, as he feels it misrepresents the group.

John Grisham

Schumacher has also directed two adaptations of the books of John Grisham, The Client (1994) and A Time to Kill (1996), the latter as the personal choice of Grisham.

Batman

Schumacher would later replace Tim Burton as the director of the Batman film franchise due to the reaction by parental groups to Batman Returns (1992). He directed Batman Forever (1995), replacing Michael Keaton with Val Kilmer; the film would go on to score the highest-grossing opening weekend of 1995, and would finish as the second highest-grossing film of the year.

Inspired by this success, Warner Bros hired Schumacher to direct a sequel, Batman & Robin, in 1997. But after scathing reviews and a drop in ticket sales from the first film, Warner Bros put the series of movies on hiatus, canceling Schumacher's next planned Batman movie Batman Triumphant. On the DVD commentary, Schumacher has admitted that his movie disappointed fans of darker Batman adaptations, saying that the film was made intentionally marketable (or "toyetic") and kid-friendly. He claims to have been under heavy pressure from the studio to do so; however, he admits full responsibility and, at one point, apologizes to any fans who were disappointed. Schumacher, however, is a devoted Batman fan himself and actually would have personally preferred an adaptation of the comic Batman: Year One.

Schumacher also served as the director for the music videos of two songs appearing in the franchise, "Kiss from a Rose", by Seal and "The End Is the Beginning Is the End" by The Smashing Pumpkins (co-directed with Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris).

Post-Batman career

After back-to-back Grisham and Batman films, Schumacher decided to reinvent his career with darker, lower-budget fare like 8MM with Nicolas Cage, and Flawless with Robert De Niro. In 1999, Schumacher also directed the music video for "Letting the Cables Sleep" by English rock band Bush. In 2000, Schumacher directed the Vietnam-era boot camp drama Tigerland, which introduced Hollywood to a young Colin Farrell. Kirk Honeycutt of The Hollywood Reporter praised the film as such: "Tigerland lands squarely in the top tier of best movies about America's Vietnam experience."

Schumacher returned to big-budget Hollywood with Bad Company starring Anthony Hopkins and Chris Rock. The film was originally slated to be released in November 2001 but because of the September 11 attacks, it was pushed back to the summer of 2002 because of its theme about terrorist attacks in New York City. The film was panned by most critics and was a box office failure. In 2003, he released the controversial Phone Booth, which reteamed Schumacher with Farrell. The film was also delayed months not only due to 9/11, but later, the Beltway sniper attacks. It received generally positive reviews, earning a 71 percent "Fresh" rating on the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes. Buoyed by Farrell's recently new-found fame, the film would earn $98.7 million worldwide.

In 2002, he directed Cate Blanchett in the Jerry Bruckheimer-produced biopic Veronica Guerin. It is about the eponymous Irish journalist, who was murdered by drug dealers in 1996.

Schumacher directed a film version of the musical The Phantom of the Opera in 2004, an adaptation of Andrew Lloyd Webber's original stage musical. Despite mixed reviews, the film earned $154.6 million worldwide (Schumacher's biggest hit of the 21st Century to date) and was nominated for three Academy Awards, as well as three Golden Globes including Best Motion Picture-Musical or Comedy.

The director has since filmed The Number 23, which was a critical flop but a financial success.

His next project was vampire thriller Blood Creek, which filmed in the spring of 2007 in rural Romania.

In August 2008, Schumacher directed the music video for American rock band Scars on Broadway, for their upcoming single "World Long Gone".

In August 2010, production began on his next film, Trespass. The action-thriller reunited Schumacher with stars Nicole Kidman and Nicolas Cage.

Sexuality

Schumacher has been openly homosexual through most of his career. In Liz Smith's memoir, Natural Blonde, she states that "He called himself 'A Sexual Outlaw'".

Batman Forever, and to an even greater degree its 1997 sequel Batman & Robin, generated controversy for what conservative fans considered to be homo-erotic innuendos.

Recurring collaborators

Schumacher often casts the same actors in different films. Kiefer Sutherland, Colin Farrell, Shea Whigham are among his more frequent acting collaborators.

Harry Gregson-Williams often composes the music for his movies and Mark Stevens often serves as editor.