David Mamet –– “House of Games”
If it feels like some of the writers on this list kind of lucked into direction having written a film (or several) that became a mainstream success thereafter, there are a few others whose writerly voice was already so established that the idea of having them direct a straightforward genre film is kind of inconceivable (see also: Charlie Kaufman). And David Mamet definitely falls into the latter camp having already made his name with screenplays (“The Postman Always Rings Twice” remake, “The Verdict,”) but to a larger extent with theatrical plays (“American Buffalo,” “Sexual Perversity in Chicago,” “Glengarry Glen Ross”), before he took his seat for the first time behind the camera. The result, “House of Games” is a wholly Mamet-ian affair, a dark, surreal, twisty-turny story of deceit and duplicity in which no one’s motives are pure and no one gets a particularly happy ending, but the hard-edged intelligence and cynicism on display exerts a delicious pull all its own. Psychiatrist Margaret Ford (Lindsay Crouse, either horrifically miscast or brilliantly cast, depending on who you talk to) largely through intellectual ennui, is led into a con game (other players include Joe Mantegna, JT Walsh and Ricky Jay) in which it’s never entirely clear who’s conning who and whether the payoff can ever be worth the various sacrifices. Couched in Mamet’s stagy, gorgeously clipped, acid dialogue, the film is deliberately heightened and gives, from its opening moments, an eerie down-the-rabbit-hole feel to a genre often otherwise portrayed as just a lark. As a result it’s as much an evocation of mood as it is a plot-driven story, and that more than compensates for its chilliness.
Subsequent career: Mamet seems to keep his writing and directing careers running on parallel tracks, certainly jobbing as a prolific screenwriter for film and TV, but also regularly popping back for directorial stints, with mixed bag results. “State and Main” — his weird take on the Hollywood satire subgenre — is a film we love but no one else seems to, while his subsequent con-game/crime films range from enjoyable (“The Spanish Prisoner”) to mediocre (“Heist”). He’s also directed his own play “Oleanna” and done some TV work, notably directing the recent Al Pacino Phil Spector biopic. But most excitingly, he’s due to team up with Cate Blanchett next for “Blackbird” (a film that sounds like it has shades of “Argo”) which he’ll direct from his own script.
Joss Whedon — “Serenity”
We dithered about putting Whedon on this list, but more about whether he should be here for “The Avengers” or for “Serenity,” because while the latter is definitely his big-screen directorial debut, it is also based on a pre-existing TV show, and was seemingly collectively wished into being purely by “Firefly” fans rankling at the show’s early cancellation. But then we figured, so what, Whedon actually faced the same, if not worse, obstacles as any other first-time feature director and the grace and wit with which he did so are extraordinary. “Serenity” actually pulls off the hard task of satisfying fans of the show but not relying on your foreknowledge to pull you in, largely thanks to a story-within-a-story-within-a-story opening 10 minutes or so that so cleverly and seamlessly establishes the universe that it should maybe be taught in writing classes. Of course Whedon already knew his way around a screenplay from not just his time running ‘Buffy,’ “Angel” and “Firefly” but also from his contribution to films of varying quality from “Toy Story” to “Alien Resurrection” to “Titan AE.” Captain Mal Reynolds (Nathan Fillion) and his band of space cowboys (including Alan Tudyk, Morena Baccarin, Gina Torres and Adam Baldwin) while shielding a fugitive girl from the The Alliance (represented by Chiwetel Ejiofor’s ruthless agent), uncover an ages-old conspiracy involving the deadliest bogeymen in the universe, the Reavers. It’s an immensely enjoyable sci-fi film, and if it never totally overcomes its TV show roots, well, when the TV show was that good, it doesn’t really matter. (Is our brown coat showing?)
Subsequent Career: After suffering through the cancellation of another TV series “Dollhouse,” Whedon landed a stint writing “X-Men” comics and also scripted last year’s terrifically fun “The Cabin in the Woods.” Directorially, nothing much happened at all for Whedon however, except for some superhero team-up thingie that no one’s ever heard of. His “Much Ado About Nothing” is in theaters now (review here) and of course he’s hard at work writing and prepping “Avengers 2” which will, most probably, break all known records and have a lot of good jokes in it. Perhaps you’re thinking about other stuff you’d love to see him tackle, seeing as guy’s got range? We certainly were.
Tony Gilroy — “Michael Clayton”
As this list will show as it goes on, screenwriters can break through into successful directing careers, but truly excellent debuts from screenwriter-turned-directors are rarer. But you can’t get much better than Tony Gilroy’s excellent morality drama, “Michael Clayton” in terms of success metrics. Can you think of any other screenwriter-turned-director, or hell, any feature-length debut that earned itself seven Oscar nominations including Best Picture, Best Director, and all the lead actors? (Tilda Swinton won Best Supporting actress). This is, of course, in no small part due to the fact that Gilroy is an excellent screenwriter who knows character, story and conflict like the back of his hand. The screenwriting architect of all the “Bourne” films, even when the franchise changed directors, Gilroy was arguably its heart and soul and a fundamental part of what helped raise the movie into a brainy, far-above-average action thriller. But before ‘Clayton’, Gilroy had worked in the industry for almost two decades penning scripts for “Dolores Claiborne,” ‘The Devil’s Advocate,” “Armageddon” and “State Of Play,” so he certainly served his time in the salt mines, and deserves extra credit for making his debut, when it came, such an understated, intelligent pleasure.
Subsequent Career: Gilroy’s directed two features since ‘Clayton,’ both of which he wrote and we can probably assume — if all goes well — that unlike some guys on this list who have gone back to screenwriting for hire (Zaillian), he’s going to keep going with the writing-his-own-material-to-direct vein. While neither film has been as creatively successful as ‘Clayton,’ it’s admittedly a hard one to top. His immediate follow-up was the more frothy, but complex spy-romance caper, “Duplicity,” and then after that he helmed the fourth ‘Bourne’ film “The Bourne Legacy,” and the first in the series without Jason Bourne himself. It wasn’t the huge hit that Universal had hoped for, but they’re aiming to have a sequel so clearly they’re still invested in this universe.