Jim Sheridan

This article is about the film director Jim Sheridan,. For other people, see James Sheridan.

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Jim Sheridan
File:Jim Sheridan.jpg
Born	(1949-02-06) 6 February 1949 Dublin, Ireland
Other names	Shay
Occupation	Film director, screenwriter, producer
Years active	1989–present
Known for	My Left Foot (1989) In the Name of the Father (1993) The Boxer (1997) In America (2002)

Jim Sheridan (born 6 February 1949) is an Irish playwright, screenwriter, film director, and film producer. Between 1989 and 1993, Sheridan directed two critically acclaimed films set in Ireland, My Left Foot and In the Name of the Father, and later directed the films The Boxer and In America. Sheridan has received six Academy Award nominations.

Life and career

Jim Sheridan was born in Dublin, Ireland on 6 February 1949. He is the brother of playwright Peter Sheridan. The family ran a lodging house, while Anna Sheridan worked at a hotel and Peter Sheridan Snr was a railway clerk with CIÉ. Sheridan's early education was at a Christian Brothers school. In 1969 he attended University College Dublin to study English and History. He became involved in student theater there, where he met Neil Jordan, who also was later to become an important Irish film director. After graduating from UCD in 1972, Sheridan and his brother began writing and staging plays, and in the late 1970s began working with the Project Theatre Company.

In 1981, Sheridan emigrated to Canada, but eventually settled in the Hell's Kitchen section of New York City. He enrolled in NYU's Tisch School of the Arts and became the artistic director of the Irish Arts Center.

Sheridan returned to Ireland in the late 1980s. In 1989, he directed My Left Foot, which became a critical and commercial success and won Daniel Day-Lewis and Brenda Fricker Academy Awards. He followed that with The Field (with Richard Harris) in 1990; then with In the Name of the Father in 1993, a fictionalized re-telling of the case of the Guildford Four. The film won the Golden Bear at the 44th Berlin International Film Festival.

In 1996 he co-wrote Some Mother's Son with Terry George. The Boxer (with Daniel Day-Lewis) was nominated for a Golden Globe for best film drama in 1997. The film was Sheridan's third collaboration with Day-Lewis after My Left Foot and In the Name of the Father, making him the only director to work with Day-Lewis on three films. In 2003, he released the semi-autobiographical In America, which tells the story of a family of Irish immigrants trying to succeed in New York. The film received positive reviews and earned Samantha Morton and Djimon Hounsou Academy Award nominations. In 2005 he released Get Rich or Die Tryin', a film starring rap star 50 Cent.

Sheridan helmed the 2009 film Brothers, starring Tobey Maguire and Jake Gyllenhaal, which was shot in New Mexico. He also directed the thriller Dream House, which starred Daniel Craig, Naomi Watts, and Rachel Weisz.

Filmography

Films

Title	Year	Director	Producer	Writer	Notes
My Left Foot	1989	Yes	No	Yes	Directorial Debut
The Field	1990	Yes	No	Yes
Into the West	1992	No	No	Yes
In the Name of the Father	1993	Yes	Yes	Yes
Some Mother's Son	1996	No	Yes	Yes
The Boxer	1997	Yes	Yes	Yes
Agnes Browne	1999	No	Yes	No
In America	2002	Yes	Yes	Yes
Get Rich or Die Tryin'	2005	Yes	Yes	No
A Portrait of an Artist: The Making of 'Get Rich or Die Tryin'	2006	No	Yes	No	Documentary short
Brothers	2009	Yes	No	No
Dream House	2011	Yes	No	No
The Secret Scripture	2016	Yes	Yes	Yes
11th Hour	2017	Yes	No	Yes	Short film
Lockerbie	TBA	Yes	No	Yes	Announced

Executive producer

• Borstal Boy (2000)
• On the Edge (2001)
• Bloody Sunday (2002)
• Where's Daddy! (2006) (Short film)
• Dollhouse (2012)
• Omar Sharif's Tribute (2015) (Documentary)
• The Making of the Secret Scripture (2017) (Documentary)
• Inside Apollo House (2017) (TV documentary film)
• The Making of 11th Hour (2017) (Documentary short)
• Shelter me: Apollo House (2018) (Documentary)
• First Disco (2019) (Short film)
• Hitmanforhire.net (TBA)

Acting credits

Title	Year	Role	Notes
Words Upon the Window Pane	1994	Jonathan Swift / Dean Swift
The General	1998	CPAD Leader
The Carpenter and His Clumsy Wife	2004	Narrator (voice)	Short film
The Bridge of San Luis Rey	2004	The King of Spain
What If	2006	Himself	Short film
Hannah Cohen's Holy Communion	2012	Father O'Brien	Short film
The Family Way	2017	Eugene	Short film
Death by Prescription	TBA	Seamus	Pre-production

Television series

Title	Year	Credited as	Notes
Thursday Play Date	1979	Writer and actor	Episode "Mobile Homes"

Music video

• You Made Me the Thief of Your Heart by Sinéad O'Connor (1994)

Awards and nominations

Academy Awards

• Best Original Screenplay – In America (2004), nomination (as co-writer)
• Best Adapted Screenplay – In the Name of the Father (1994), nomination (as co-writer)
• Best Director – In the Name of the Father (1994), nomination (as director)
• Best Picture – In the Name of the Father (1994), nomination (as producer)
• Best Adapted Screenplay – My Left Foot (1990), nomination (as co-writer)
• Best Director – My Left Foot (1990), nomination (as director)

Berlin Film Festival

• 1994, Golden Bear – In the Name of the Father, winner
• 1998, Golden Bear – The Boxer, nomination

British Academy Film Awards

• Best Adapted Screenplay – In the Name of the Father (1993), nomination (as co-writer)

Golden Globe Awards

• Best Screenplay – In America (2002), nomination (as co-writer)
• Best Director – The Boxer (1997), nomination

Independent Spirit Awards

• Best Director – In America (2002), nomination
• Best Director - The Secret Scripture (2016), nomination
• Best Director - Brothers (2009), winner
• Lifetime Achievement Award - (2015), Winner

National Board of Review

• Best Original Screenplay – In America (2002), winner (as co-writer)

Writers Guild of America

• Best Original Screenplay – In America (2002), nomination (as co-writer)

Gregory Peck Award

• Lifetime Achievement - Dingle International Film Festival (2009)

External links

• Jim Sheridan at the Internet Movie Database
• Jim Sheridan at the BFI's Screenonline
• Jim Sheridan Bibliography (via UC Berkeley)

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