Roger Michell is a British theatre, television and film director.
Early life
Michell was born in Pretoria, South Africa. His father was an English diplomat. He spent significant parts of his childhood in Beirut, Damascus and Prague. He was educated at Clifton College in Bristol, where he began directing and writing short plays. He then studied at Queens' College, Cambridge, from which he graduated in 1977.
Career
After graduating from Cambridge in 1977, Michell moved to London and began an apprenticeship at the Royal Court Theatre and where he worked as assistant director to British playwrightJohn Osborne and Irish playwright Samuel Beckett. During this period, he also worked with Max Stafford Clark, Simon Curtis, Hanif Kureishi and, as a stage-manager, Danny Boyle. In 1979 he left the Royal Court Theatre and began writing and directing projects on his own. The most successful of these ventures was 1982's Private Dick a comedy which won the Fringe First Award at the Edinburgh Festival. The play later debuted in London's West End and featured Robert Powell as Philip Marlowe. In 1985, Michell joined the Royal Shakespeare Company where, as a resident director, he directed plays by Shakespeare, Havel, Nelson, Bond, Farquhar, Darke, and others. He also directed Some Americans Abroad, which transferred to Broadway in 1990. In 1993, he directed the BBC miniseries adaptation of Hanif Kureishi's autobiographical novelThe Buddha of Suburbia, starring Naveen Andrews. He followed that with the BBC film Persuasion in 1995, which won the 1995 BAFTA for Best Single Drama. Michell then directed My Night with Reg and Titanic Town. Michell was chosen by Richard Curtis to direct his script Notting Hill. He then directed the 2002 box office hit Changing Lanes starring Ben Affleck and Samuel L. Jackson. In 2003, he directed The Mother, written by Hanif Kureishi and starring Daniel Craig. Craig also starred in Michell's next film, Enduring Love, an adaptation of Ian McEwan's novel. Michell then directed Peter O'Toole in 2006's Venus, again written by Kureishi. Michell was in negotiations to work with Craig yet again in 2006 and direct the James Bond filmQuantum of Solace, but these talks fell through due to "creative differences". Michell later expanded that he reached "tipping point" with producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G Wilson who were "desperate" to release the film in 2007, despite the lack of a script, which "freaked" Michell out causing him to leave the project. The producers eventually put the film back a year with Marc Forster at the helm. His next film was 2010's Morning Glory, a comedy starring Rachel McAdams and Harrison Ford set in the world of morning news, produced by J.J. Abrams. Michell directed Hyde Park on Hudson starring Bill Murray as United States President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
