Happy 60th Birthday, Richard Linklater! Born today in 1960 as Richard Stuart Linklater, this American screenwriter, producer and director is known for humanist films that revolve mainly around suburban culture and the effects of the passage of time.
Born in Houston, Texas, Linklater, years later, attended Huntsville High School in Huntsville. This was during grades ninth through eleventh.
He played football for American high school football coach and college football player Joe Clements as a backup quarterback for the number one ranked team in the state.
For his senior year, Linklater moved to Bellaire High School in Bellaire, because he was a better at baseball than football and Bellaire had a better baseball coach. As a teenager, Linklater won a Scholastic Art and Writing Award.
Linklater later studied at Sam Houston State University (where he also played baseball), until dropping out to work on an off-shore oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico.
He frequently read novels on the rig and, upon returning to land, developed a love of film through repeated visits to a repertory theater in Houston.
At this point, Linklater realized he wanted to be a filmmaker. He used his savings to buy a Super-8 camera, a projector, and editing equipment, and moved to Austin.
In the fall of 1984, he enrolled in Austin Community College to study film.
Six years later, Linklater wrote, produced, directed and co-starred in the first film of which he is best known. This was his 1991 American independent comedy-drama film 'Slacker'.
The film follows a single day in the life of an ensemble of mostly under-thirty bohemians and misfits in Austin, Texas.
It also follows various characters and scenes, never staying with one character or conversation for more than a few minutes before picking up someone else in the scene and following them.
Austin is an Eden for the young and unambitious, from the enthusiastically eccentric to the dangerously apathetic.
Here, the nobly lazy can eschew responsibility in favor of nursing their esoteric obsessions. The locals include backseat philosopher Should Have Stayed at Bus Station (Linklater) who passionately expounds on his dream theories to a seemingly comatose cabbie (Rudy Basquez).
A young woman (Teresa Taylor) tries to hawk Madonna's Pap smear test to anyone who will listen, and a kindly old anarchist (Louis Mackey) looks for recruits.
'Slacker' was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize - Dramatic at the 13th Sundance Film Festival in January 1991. On a budget of $23,000, 'Slacker' grossed $1.230,000 at the box office.
Despite the popularity of many of his films and having directed multiple high-paying Hollywood productions, Linklater remains in Austin and refuses to live or work in Hollywood for any extended period of time.
Inspiration for Linklater's work was largely based on his experience viewing Martin Scorsese's 1980 American black and white/color (some scenes) biographical sport/drama film 'Raging Bull'.
Said Linklater: "It made me see movies as a potential outlet for what I was thinking about and hoping to express. At that point I was an unformed artist. At that moment, something was simmering in me, but Raging Bull brought it to a boil."
In 2012, 'Slacker' was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".
Two years later, Linklater wrote, co-produced and directed the second and final film of which he is best known. This was the epic 2014 American coming-of-age drama film 'Boyhood'.
Set in Texas, the joys and pitfalls of growing up are seen through the eyes of a child named Mason Evans Jr. (Ellar Coltrane) from six to eighteen.
The film also tells of his divorced parents, Olivia Evans (Patricia Arquette), Mason Sr. (Ethan Hawke) and his sister Samantha (Lorelei Linklater).
Vignettes, ambitiously filmed with the same cast over the course of twelve years, capture family meals, road trips, birthday parties, graduations and other important milestones.
Songs artists featured on the film's soundtrack include Coldplay, Arcade Fire and other musicians, each of whom capture the time period. The song "Hero" by American indie rock band Family of the Year was prominently used in the film.
Production began in 2001 and finished in 2013, with Linklater's goal to make a film about growing up. The project began without a completed script, with only basic plot points and the ending written initially.
Linklater developed the script throughout production, writing the next year's portion of the film after rewatching the previous year's footage.
He incorporated changes he saw in each actor into the script, while also allowing all major actors to participate in the writing process by incorporating their life experiences into their characters' stories.
Premiering at the 36th Sundance Film Festival in January 2014, 'Boyhood' went on to receive many accolades.
Most notably, this included six Oscars, winning Best Supporting Actress (Patrica Arquette). This occurred at the 87th Academy Awards in late March 2015.
Later that same year, Linklater was included on the annual Time 100 list of the 100 Most Influential People In The World.
Linklater is also k own for directing 'Dazed and Confused' (1993),the –2013), 'Waking Life' (2001), 'School of Rock' (2003), 'A Scanner Darkly' (2006) and 'Everyone Wants Some!!'(2016).
Linklater has been influenced by Robert Bresson, Yasujirō Ozu, Rainer Werner Fassbender, Josef Von Sternberg and Carl Theodor Dreyer.
According to his personal life, Linklater, though not married, has been partnered with Christina Harrison since the 1990s.
Their oldest child, Mexican-born American actress Lorelei Linklater, co-starred in 'Boyhood' as Samantha, the sister of Mason. In May 2004, Linklater and Harrison had twin daughters.
Linklater has has been a vegetarian since his early twenties.
Many of Linklater's films take place in a single day. They are less plot driven and more about human interactions between people and they vary in time and situation.
Despite the popularity of many of his films and having directed multiple high-paying Hollywood productions, Linklater remains in Austin, Texas and refuses to live or work in Hollywood for any extended period of time.
Linklater was among the first and most successful talents to emerge during the American independent film renaissance of the 1990s, typically setting each of his features during one twenty-four-hour period.
Many of his films are noted for their loosely structured narrative; several of his projects feature the same actors filmed over an extended period of years.
His work explored what he dubbed "the youth rebellion continuum," focusing in fine detail on generational rites and mores with rare compassion and understanding.
This was while definitively capturing the twenty-something culture of his era through a series of nuanced, illuminating ensemble pieces which introduced any number of talented young actors into the Hollywood firmament.
Linklater is known to have a distinct style and method of filmmaking. Many of his films are noted for their loosely structured narrative; several of his projects feature the same actors filmed over an extended period of years.
Linklater has been active from 1985–present.
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