James Mangold

With many feature films to date, including the award-winning Walk the Line, 3:10 to Yuma, Heavy and Girl, Interrupted, JAMES MANGOLD is a director known for making sophisticated ensemble films in a wide range of genres while keeping constant the powerful themes, original characterizations, sterling performances and striking imagery that have come to define and unify his work.

The son of renowned painters Robert Mangold and Sylvia Plimack Mangold, Mangold was raised in New York's Hudson Valley. He graduated in film and acting from California Institute of the Arts, where he studied with Alexander Mackendrick (Sweet Smell of Success, The Ladykillers).

He broke into the film business at the age of 21 as the recipient of a prestigious writer/director deal with Disney. After a few years in Hollywood he decided to go to Columbia University's film school, where be began writing the film Heavy while studying under Oscar winning director Milos Forman. Heavy went on to win the Director's Prize at the 1996 Sundance Film Festival and was selected to represent the United States at Director's Fortnight in the Cannes Film Festival. Following the critical success of Heavy, Mangold began production on his second film, Cop Land, an urban Western set in modern-day New Jersey starring Sylvester Stallone, Harvey Keitel, Robert DeNiro, Ray Liotta and Janeane Garafalo. The film was accepted into the main competition of the Cannes Film Festival and premiered in the U.S. to strong reviews. It was on this film that began his enduring creative partnership with producer Cathy Konrad (Kids, Beautiful Girls, Citizen Ruth, Scream and all of Mangold's subsequent films).

Mangold continued his tradition of documenting the inner struggles of conflicted individuals by adapting Susanna Kaysen's Girl, Interrupted for the screen. The film went on to win a Best Supporting Actress Golden Globe and Oscar for Angelina Jolie's performance as Lisa, the charming sociopath who befriends the protagonist, played by Winona Ryder. Mangold then went on to make the romantic comedy Kate & Leopold, starring Meg Ryan and Hugh Jackman, and the mind-bending thriller Identity, starring John Cusack and Ray Liotta.

Walk the Line, an enormous success with critics and audiences alike, starred Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon as the legendary music couple Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash. Both actors performed their own vocals for the movie, and took home Golden Globes for their performances and the film also won the Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture - Musical or Comedy. The film received five Academy Award nominations, and Witherspoon won for Best Performance by an Actress. A project long in the works (Mangold and Konrad began work on it a decade ago), it was developed with the assistance and collaboration of John and June Carter Cash until their deaths in 2003.

Mangold also directed 3:10 to Yuma, starring Russell and Christian Bale; the gritty Western was warmly greeted by the press and audiences alike, and received award nomination from an impressive array of critics groups--including two Oscar nominations--with the cast receiving a nod from SAG for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture.

Mangold also directed the pilot episode of the ABC romantic comedy/drama Men in Trees, starring Anne Heche, which debuted in fall 2006 and ran for two successful seasons on ABC. The series was produced by Mangold and Cathy Konrad's production company, Tree/Line Films.

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