Anthony McCarten
The biographical film — a form that asks a screenwriter to compress a life into two hours without flattening it — found a particular practitioner in the early decades of the twenty-first century. Anthony McCarten, born on January 1, 1961, in New Plymouth, New Zealand, built a career that ranged across several disciplines before becoming closely identified with the demands and possibilities of that form.
Educated at Massey University and Victoria University of Wellington, McCarten worked as a journalist, novelist, playwright, and dramaturge before moving into film. His roles in the industry extended beyond writing: he has worked as a screenwriter, film director, and film producer, bringing to each project an engagement with the material that crosses professional categories. It is as a screenwriter, however, that his output has been most publicly visible. Over roughly a decade, he wrote a succession of biopics that drew on the lives of figures from science, politics, music, and religion. These included The Theory of Everything in 2014, Darkest Hour in 2017, Bohemian Rhapsody in 2018, The Two Popes in 2019, and Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance with Somebody in 2022. Each film required adapting the documentary record of a recognizable life into dramatic narrative, a task that places distinct pressures on a screenwriter's craft.
The critical and institutional response to this body of work has been substantial. McCarten received four Academy Award nominations across his career, with two of those — for Best Adapted Screenplay — coming from The Theory of Everything and The Two Popes respectively. The recognition placed him among a small group of screenwriters to have received multiple nominations in a single category.
His work as a playwright and dramaturge runs alongside his film career, reflecting a professional formation that preceded his involvement in cinema. A New Zealand citizen who writes in English, McCarten has continued to work across these overlapping disciplines. The dual Academy Award nominations for adapted screenplay remain the most formally documented measure of his reception within the film industry.
Quotes by Anthony McCarten
The New Zealand sense of humor is tough and realistic. Jokes are not surreal; they are about life and death and tough decisions.
When I was growing up in the '80s and working in the theater, David Mamet exploded with a whole new reworking of what dialogue should sound like. It was punchy and raw and repetitive, bursting with dynamic. I remember that switching on a lot of lights for me.
I am so superstitious that I think even discussing this subject is dangerous and will probably bring me terrible luck. Having been raised a Catholic, superstition becomes almost part of your DNA. The challenge is to slowly rid yourself of these little delusions.
As you get older, you become more vain. But as your looks slowly deteriorate, your eyesight worsens, so it all balances out.
It's impossible to make a living in the arts unless you make a fortune. There's almost no in-between. Writers are either broke or rolling in it. Oddly, you can't tell them apart.
I still present myself as a New Zealander, answering people's questions about New Zealand and contributing in my own unlikely way to the global perception that Kiwis can and do fly high.
If we did not have the impulse and ability to believe in the impossible, we would not have religion, democracy, or marriage.