Masterclass with Paul Haggis

Sunday, April 23
3:30PM – 4:55PM
John Bassett Theatre

Two time Academy Award winning Director/Writer/Producer, Paul Haggis joins the TSC for a masterclass on creating engaging, memorable, and exciting stories for the big screen. Paul will be joined by moderator Elan Mastai, Writer of THE F WORD.

Paul Haggis is the first screenwriter to write two Best Film Oscar winners back-to-back: MILLION DOLLAR BABY (2004) directed by Clint Eastwood, and CRASH (2005) which he himself directed.  For CRASH, Haggis won Academy Awards for Best Picture and Best Original Screenplay. The film also received an additional four nominations including one for Haggis' direction. CRASH reaped numerous awards during its year of release from associations such as the IFP Spirit Awards, the Screen Actors Guild, and BAFTA.

In 2006, Haggis' screenplays included the duo Clint Eastwood productions FLAGS OF OUR FATHERS and LETTERS FROM IWO JIMA, the latter earning him his third screenplay Oscar nomination. He also helped pen CASINO ROYALE, which garnered considerable acclaim for reinvigorating the James Bond spy franchise.

In 2007, Haggis wrote, directed, and produced IN THE VALLEY OF ELAH. The film starred Tommy Lee Jones, Charlize Theron, and Susan Sarandon, and earned Jones a Best Actor Oscar nomination for his performance. 

In 2010, his film THE NEXT THREE DAYS was released, starring Russell Crowe, Liam Neeson, and Elizabeth Banks.

And in 2013 he wrote and directed the romantic, personal drama THIRD PERSON, which starred Liam Neeson, Olivia Wilde, Mila Kunis, Adrien Brody, James Franco, and Kim Basinger. 

Most recently, Haggis directed all six episodes of the HBO mini-series SHOW ME A HERO, starring Oscar Isaac, Catherine Keener, Winona Ryder, James Belushi, and Alfred Molina.

Currently, Haggis is co-directing a feature length documentary on the AIDS crises in San Francisco, called WARD 5B.

Equally committed to his private and social concerns, Haggis is the founder of Artists for Peace and Justice. Under this umbrella, many of his friends in the film business have come forward to build schools and a rehabilitation clinic serving the children of the slums of Haiti (www.APJNow.org). 

He resides in New York.

Elan Mastai has had five features produced from his screenplays, most recently THE F WORD (released internationally as WHAT IF), directed by Michael Dowse and starring Daniel Radcliffe, Zoe Kazan, Adam Driver, and Mackenzie Davis. It premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival, was theatrically released in more than 30 countries, and won Elan both the Canadian Screen Award and the Writers Guild of Canada Award for his script. In 2013, Variety named Elan one of its “Ten Screenwriters To Watch”. His previous features include THE SAMARITAN, starring Oscar-nominees Samuel L Jackson, Ruth Negga, and Tom Wilkinson, which he co-wrote and also produced. Elan has developed movies for Paramount, Warner Brothers, Sony, Fox, and Fox Searchlight, and a TV series for the FX network. His debut novel, All Our Wrong Todays, was published in 2017 by Penguin Random House and is being translated into more than two dozen languages. A film adaptation is in the works at Paramount, with Amy Pascal producing and Elan writing the screenplay.