Oscar Profile: Paul Thomas Anderson

Born June 26, 1970 in Los Angeles, California to Edwina and Ernie Anderson, Paul Thomas Anderson’s father was a radio and TV personality, horror host and announcer and one of the first owners of a VCR with a vast collection of classic films for his son to cut his teeth on.

Young Anderson began shooting films on video tape and editing them from VCR to VCR. He made his first one at 8. At 18, he made a 30-minute film in high school called The Dirk Diggler Story based on the life of porn star John Holmes. It would become the basis of his second full-length feature film, 1997’s Boogie Nights.

Anderson’s 1993 short film, Cigarettes & Coffee was screened at the Sundance Film Festival. It led to his first full-length feature film, 1996’s Hard Eight which was an expansion of Cigarettes & Coffee. It starred Philip Baker Hall, John C. Reilly, Gwyneth Paltrow, and Samuel L. Jackson.

Next up for Anderson was 1997’s Boogie Nights, an extended version of The Dirk Diggler Story starring Mark Wahlberg, Julianne Moore, and Burt Reynolds. It earned Oscar nominations for Moore, Reynolds, and Anderson, his first for Best Original Screenplay. His next film, 1999’s Magnolia, starring amongst others, Tom Cruise Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Julianne Moore, earned Oscar nominations for Cruise, Aimee Mann for the song “Save Me” and Anderson who received his second for Best Original Screenplay.

In 2001, Anderson married actress Maya Rudolph. One of contemporary Hollywood’s longest lasting marriages, the couple has four children.

Anderson’s fourth narrative theatrical film was 2002’s comedy-drama, Punch-Drunk Love starring Adam Sandler, Emily Watson, and Philip Seymour Hoffman. His fifth was 2007’s There Will Be Blood based on Upton Sinclair’s 1927 novel, Oil. It starred Daniel Day-Lewis and Paul Dano. Nominated for 8 Oscars, it won two, Best Actor (Day-Lewis) and Best Cinematography. Anderson received three of the film’s nominations for Best Picture, Director, and Adapted Screenplay.

Anderson’s sixth film, 2012’s The Master starring Joaquin Phoenix, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Amy Adams earned Oscar nominations only for its three stars. His seventh, 2014’s Inherent Vice earned Anderson a nomination for his adapted screenplay along with a nod for its costume design.

Anderson’s eight film, 2017’s Phantom Thread earned him nominations for Best Picture and Best Director among its six nods. Daniel Day-Lewis, in his last film to date, and Lesley Manville were nominated for their performances.

Anderson’s 2021 film, Licorice Pizza, only his ninth in a quarter century, earned him another three Oscar nominations for Best Picture, Director, and Original Screenplay, the only nods the film received. He now has eleven Oscar nominations two more than he has full length feature films to his credit.

What’s next for the 53-year-old filmmaker?

ESSENTIAL FILMS

BOOGIE NIGHTS (1997)

Expertly tackling pornography, drugs, and disco, is not an easy task but writer-director Anderson handles it all brilliantly in this expanded version of his 1988 short film, The Dick Dangler Story. Mark Wahlberg in a star making turn, is excellent as the young male porn star with strong support from Oscar nominated Burt Reynolds as his producer and Julianne Moore and Heather Graham as female porn stars. Anderson also gets fine performances from Don Cheadle, William H. Macy, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and John C. Reilly. Wahlberg was recommended for his role by Leonardo DiCaprio who turned it down to make Titanic.

MAGNOLIA (1999)

Anderson wrote his Oscar nominated script while staying at William H. Macy’s Vermont cabin for two weeks because he was afraid to go outside because of a snake. The brilliant mosaic of characters interacting in L.A.’s San Fernando Valley features strong work by Tom Cruise, Jason Robards (in his last film), Julianne Moore, Macy, Philip Seymour Hoffman, John C, Reilly, and Philip Baker Hall, all but Cruise and Robards, members of Anderson’s informal stock company. Hoffman and Moore received National Board of Review awards for their performances, but it was Cruise who scored the film’s only acting Oscar nod.

THERE WILL BE BLOOD (2007)

Daniel Day-Lewis’ second of three Oscar winning performances is arguably the best of his career. He is completely mesmerizing as the ruthless businessman, cold-hearted and manipulative to the end in Anderson’s brilliant adaptation of Upton Sinclair’s 1927 novel, Oil. Paul Dano as his nemesis, an evangelical preacher, is equally fine as is Dillon Freasier as Day-Lewis’ deaf son. Freasier was not an actor but an elementary school student in West Texas where the film was made. His mother was the traffic cop who gave a speeding ticket to Anderson’s casting director who talked her into allowing the boy to play the role.

THE MASTER (2012)

Set in the late 1940s and early 1950s, the lead performances were what set this one apart, and all three of them were nominated for Oscars. Joaquin Phoenix had the lead role of a shell-shocked psychotic drunken World War II veteran who falls under the spell of a religious cult led by Philip Seymour Hoffman in a role patterned after L. Ron Hubbard, the Scientology founder. Both actors are brilliant, Phoenix almost matching Daniel Day-Lewis’ intensity in There Will Be Blood. Amy Adams almost equals them in a smaller role as Hoffman’s wife. Anderson considers this the film of which he is most proud.

LICORICE PIZZA (2021)

This romantic romcom of sorts is about an older woman and a younger man, a teenager actually, getting together in the San Fernando Valley of the 1970s. The woman is played by singer Alana Haim, who had been featured in several of Anderson’s short films. Her mother had been a teacher Anderson had a crush on. The boy is played by Cooper Hoffman, the son of Anderson’s friend and frequent player in his films, the late Philip Seymour Hoffman. The supporting cast includes Haim’s real-life family, George DiCaprio, Leo’s father, as a waterbed dealer, and Bradley Cooper as hairdresser turned film producer Jon Peters.