Alexander Payne M.F.A. ’90

Filmmaker Alexander Payne M.F.A. ’90, writer and director of The Descendants, had a lot to celebrate the night of the 84th Annual Academy Awards. His film, based on Kaui Hart Hemmings’ novel by the same title, tells the story of a family man who finds out his wife was having an affair, while she is in a coma. Payne won the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay for his film. However, this is not the first Oscar win for the Bruin in this category. He previously walked away with the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay for his 2005 film Sideways, which had been nominated in five different categories.

Clearly, Payne is no stranger to awards. In 2005, Sideways led the pack at the Golden Globes with seven nominations. The film landed trophies for Best Motion Picture-Musical or Comedy and Best Screenplay-Motion Picture. And in 2003, his film About Schmidt, earned five Golden Globe nominations and won a Best Screenplay statue for Payne and Best Actor statue for Jack Nicholson. Additionally, Payne’s 1999 film Election earned him the Independent Spirit Award for Best Director and Best Film and an Oscar nomination for Best Screenplay.

Payne traces his professional success back to his UCLA thesis film, The Passion of Martin, dubbed a dark comedy. Discussing the film in Entertainment Weekly, he said, “When people say ‘dark,’ what they really mean is ‘real.’” Then he adds that the film is genuinely dark, but it got Payne off to a bright start. Six weeks later, on the strength of that film, which screened at the Sundance Film Festival in 1991, he got an agent and a writing-directing deal with Universal.

Not long after, the critically acclaimed Citizen Ruth, starring a host of Hollywood and Broadway A-list actors, marked Payne’s commercial film debut in 1996.

Discussing his career, Payne says, “I’m most moved by stories like Sideways that are about human beings and human nature, that are about flawed people and ambiguous moments that don’t necessarily come to any neat closure.”