Paul Thomas Anderson

The incredible creative talent Paul Thomas Anderson is an award-winning and critically acclaimed filmmaker. He is best known for his movies Boogie Nights, Magnolia, There Will Be Blood, and Inherent Vice, and for his music videos for artists such as Radiohead, Joanna Newsom, and Aimee Mann.

Born and raised in Los Angeles, Anderson was encourage to pursue a career in film by his actor father Ernie Anderson. He made his first film when he was eight-years-old, and began writing as a teenager. He attended a number of colleges before starting to work as a production assistant on film, TV, music videos, and game shows. He kept making short films, and in 1994 was invited to the Sundance Feature Film Program. He then directed his first full-length movie, Sydney, which was later retitled as Hard Eight, and submitted it to the 1996 Cannes Film Festival. It was critically acclaimed and launched his career.

But it was Anderson’s second feature, Boogie Nights (which was based on a short mockumentary he had made in 1988), that proved to be his breakout film. It starred Mark Wahlberg as a nightclub dishwasher who becomes a porn star, and launched the actor into the big time. The movie also revived the career of 1970’s icon Burt Reynolds, seeing the veteran star receive his first Oscar nomination. Anderson has gone on to make six more movies, including the acclaimed Magnolia, and Punch-Drunk Love, as well as Oscar-winners There Will Be Blood, and Phantom Thread.