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 Born on November 16, 1970 in Shaker Heights, Ohio, US, Jamie Babbit is now one of the world’s most renowned and respected lesbian film directors. A graduate of Barnard College, Columbia University, New York, she began her film career during her university days by working with a number of world class directors including Martin Scorsese (The Age of Innocence), and later with David Fincher (The Game). She has also worked with Su Friedrich (Hide and Seek), Nancy Savoca (If These Walls Could Talk) and Alex Sichel (All Over Me).
No stranger to pushing social and political boundaries and fascinated by extreme human behaviour, Jamie covers a variety of social and political themes in her movies, including feminism, activism, sexuality, relationships, homophobia and even incest.
Jamie’s first short films were Frog Crossing and Sleeping Beauties, both of which premiered at Sundance and played at over 60 other festivals. She directed Frog Crossing in 1996 with Ari Gold, about an animal rights activist who finds love while protecting frogs as they hop across a highway. This was followed by the comedy Sleeping Beauties in 1999, starring Clea DuVall (Girl, Interrupted and The Grudge) and Radha Mitchell (High Art and Pitch Black), about a young woman (Mitchell) working as a makeup artist at a funeral home who, obsessed with unavailable women, eventually meets and falls in love with a photographer (DuVall). In 2001, Jamie completed Stuck, winner of the 2002 Sundance Film Festival’s Special Mention Jury Prize, the HBO/Planet Out Grand Jury Prize, as well as the Channel 4 BBC Grand Jury Prize. Stuck was the first film produced by the American lesbian nonprofit organization POWER UP (Professional Organization of Women in Film Reaching Up), and tells the story of an elderly lesbian couple traveling across the desert who are on the verge of ending their unhappy relationship.
At home, Jamie’s mother ran a rehab programme for teenagers with drug and alcohol problems called “New Directions”, the inspiration behind the fictional reparative therapy camp “True Directions” in her feature film directional début But I’m a Cheerleader. Cheerleader is a romantic comedy concerning the trials and tribulations of a female cheerleader who discovers her true sexuality and first love at the therapy camp to which she has been sent by her homophobic family. Starring Natasha Lyonne (Megan) and Clea DuVall (Graham), the film premiered at the Toronto Film Festival in 1999, and played at Sundance, Rotterdam and Créteil where it earned Jamie the Best Young Director and the Audience Award.
Jamie’s second feature film The Quiet, a suburban thriller starring Elisha Cuthbert (Kim Bauer in TV show 24), Camilla Belle (When a Stranger Calls) and Edie Falco (Carmela Soprano in TV show The Sopranos) world premiered in September at the 2005 Toronto Film Festival, and was released by Sony Classic in spring 2006. The film is about a deaf, mute and orphaned teenager named Dot (Belle) who, sent to live with her godparents and their daughter Nina (Cuthbert), learns of an incestuous relationship between Nina and her father which drives Nina to plan the murder of her father.
An advisory board member of the Director’s Guild of America Independent Directors Committee, Jamie is also on the Board of Directors of POWER UP who produced as their first feature film her latest project Itty Bitty Titty Committee , a political love-comedy released commercially in the US in September 2007. Starring Melonie Diaz (Anna) and Nicole Vicius (Sadie) as the star-crossed lovers, the cast also includes big lesbian household names The L Word’s Daniela Sea (Calvin) and Guinevere Turner (Marcy Maloney), and Japanese-American model Jenny Shimizu in a cameo role. The film centres around the activities and love entanglements of feminist activist group the C(I)A (Clits in Action), to the background of riot grrrl music including Sleater-Kinney, Bikini Kill and Le Tigre.
Jamie has also enjoyed success in television direction and production, serving as both for the WB television series Popular, as well as directing episodes of such critically acclaimed shows as Ugly Betty, The L Word, Alias, Nip/Tuck, Malcolm in the Middle and The Gilmore Girls.
Her partner is film producer Andrea Sperling (But I’m a Cheerleader, Itty Bitty Titty Committee and D.E.B.S.), and they live together in Los Angeles with their daughter.
| Date of Birth: |
November 16, 1970 |
| Place of Birth: |
Shaker Heights, Ohio, USA |
| Nationality: |
American |
| Current Base: |
Los Angeles, USA |
| Field: |
Film Director |
| Achievements: |
Directed three feature films “But I'm a Cheerleader”, “The Quiet”, and “Itty Bitty Titty Committee”, and a number of TV shows including “The L Word”, “Nip/Tuck”, “Ugly Betty”, “Malcolm in the Middle”, “Bernie Mac”, “Dirty, Sexy, Money”, “Gossip Girl”, and “Gilmore Girls” |
| Current projects: |
Due to give birth to a second baby by insemination in November 2007 |
| Inspirations: |
Jane Campion, Carol Churchill, Anne Bogart, Paula Vogel, Kathleen Hannah, Hillary Clinton |
| Motivation: |
Personal motto is “Work hard and have no fear” |
| Information: |
MySpace Jamie Babbit |
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Itty Bitty Titty Committee trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5k1DTGdWpE |
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The Quiet trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCd95_DEmVQ |
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But I’m a Cheerleader serious trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MihKLBP4DQ |
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But I’m a Cheerleader parody trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXHbjPaZJJs |
| Message: |
“Create art and never give up. Persistence is everything.” |
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