Sam Mendes

Sam Mendes
Born	Samuel Alexander Mendes
Other names	Midas Mendes
Years active	1993 – present
Spouse	Kate Winslet (2003-)

Samuel Alexander Mendes CBE (born 1 August 1965) is an English stage and film director. As a stage director, he is probably best known for his 1998 production of Cabaret, starring Alan Cumming. As a film director, he is best known for his debut film, American Beauty, for which he won an Academy Award for Directing. In 2000, Mendes was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire. He is of Portuguese descent.

Biography

Career

Mendes first attracted attention for his assured production of Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard in the West End starring Judi Dench. He was under 25. Soon he was directing plays for the Royal Shakespeare Company where his productions, many of them featuring Simon Russell Beale, included Troilus and Cressida, Richard III and The Tempest. These productions were praised for their clarity, intelligence and stylishness.

He has also worked at the Royal National Theatre, directing Edward Bond's The Sea, Jim Cartwright's The Rise and Fall of Little Voice, Harold Pinter's The Birthday Party, and Othello with Simon Russell Beale as Iago.

In 1992 he was appointed artistic director of the Donmar Warehouse, an intimate studio space in London's West End which he quickly transformed into one of the most exciting venues in the city. His opening production was Stephen Sondheim's Assassins which revelled in the show's dark, comic brilliance and rescued it from the critical opprobrium it had suffered on its American opening. He followed this with a series of excellent classic revivals, many of which attracted some of the finest actors and biggest stars of the decade. Among Mendes's best productions were John Kander and Fred Ebb's Cabaret, Tennessee Williams's The Glass Menagerie, Stephen Sondheim's Company, Alan Bennett's Habeas Corpus and his farewell duo of Chekhov's Uncle Vanya and Twelfth Night, which transferred to the Brooklyn Academy of Music. As artistic director Mendes also gave some of the country's finest younger directors the opportunity to do some of their best work: Matthew Warchus's production of Sam Shepard's True West, Katie Mitchell's of Beckett's Endgame, David Leveaux's of Sophocles's Elektra and Tom Stoppard's The Real Thing were amongst the most critically acclaimed of the decade. The Donmar's present artistic diretor Michael Grandage directed some of the key productions of the later part of Mendes's tenure, including Peter Nichols's Passion Play and Privates on Parade and Sondheim's Merrily We Roll Along.

Theatre Career Highlights

• 1990: Began directing for the Royal Shakespeare Company.
• 1992: became artistic director of the Donmar Warehouse theatre
• 1994: directed revival of Oliver! (with score specially revised and added to by the original composer and lyricist, Lionel Bart) at the London Palladium; the show ran for four years, becoming, on 8 July 1997, the longest-running show at that venue.
• 1994: directed revival of Cabaret
• 1998: directed David Hare's The Blue Room, starring Nicole Kidman (and Iain Glen).
• 2003: directed a Broadway revival of Gypsy, starring Bernadette Peters.
• 2003: started film and theatre production company, Neal Street Productions, with Pippa Harris and Caro Newling.

Theatre Awards

• Won a Critics' Circle Theatre Award for Best Newcomer after directing Judi Dench in The Cherry Orchard.
• 1995: won Olivier Award for Best Director for The Glass Menagerie
• 1996: won Olivier Award for Best Director of a Musical for Company
• 1998: revival of Cabaret opens on Broadway; wins four Tony Awards, including Best Musical (Revival)
• 2003: won Olivier Award for Best Director for Uncle Vanya and Twelfth Night

Personal life

After a string of romances with actresses including Cameron Diaz, Calista Flockhart, Jane Horrocks, and Rachel Weisz, Mendes married English actress Kate Winslet on 24 May 2003 in Anguilla in the Caribbean. Their first child, Joe Alfie Winslet-Mendes, was born on 22 December 2004. Mendes also has a stepdaughter, Mia Honey Threapleton, from Winslet's first marriage to assistant director Jim Threapleton. The family now lives in New York City and Ascott-under-Wychwood, England.

Films

Director

Year	Film	Oscar nominations	Oscar wins
1999	American Beauty	8	5
2002	Road to Perdition	6	1
2005	Jarhead	0	0
2008	Revolutionary Road
2009	Middlemarch

Producer

Year	Film	Notes
2002	Road to Perdition
2006	Starter for Ten	(executive producer)
2007	The Kite Runner	(executive producer)
	Things We Lost in the Fire
2008	Revolutionary Road

Recurring motifs

• Through his first three feature films a narrator voiceover begins and ends the movie: Lester in American Beauty, Michael in Road to Perdition and Swofford in Jarhead.
• Often casts Chris Cooper.
• So far has enlisted Thomas Newman to score all of his films, acquiring Academy Award nominations for both American Beauty and Road to Perdition.

External links

• Sam Mendes at IMDb

References

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