Taylor Hackford
Taylor Hackford
Taylor Edwin Hackfordis an American film director and former president of the Directors Guild of America. He won the Academy Award for Best Live Action Short Film for Teenage Father. Hackford went on to direct a number of highly regarded feature films, most notably An Officer and a Gentlemanand Ray, the latter of which saw him nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director and Academy Award for Best Picture...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionDirector
Date of Birth31 December 1944
CitySanta Barbara, CA
CountryUnited States of America
Our society gives power to people who are successful. All of a sudden, if you've created something unique and interesting, you're set apart.
That whole process of somebody who has all that charisma and talent, to be able to break through and make it in America is fabulous.
But Bruckheimer didn't wilt. He said just do it without them. The great thing for me is that Jerry Bruckheimer and his team gave me all the help I needed and then they left me alone.
I'm always interested in the working class people. I am one. They're subjugated, they're paid very little and they can make it in show biz.
It's all about the same thing, being able to pull people into a situation where you have a vision, and transport that vision off the page.
I trusted my instincts here, but I'm not stupid. The next thing I did was throw him into the shark tank, ... I threw him in with Ray Charles.
When you're working in Hollywood you have these actors who go to their trailers, they're getting paid millions of dollars, they act like spoiled children. They don't really want to work. And the crew knows that. They don't respect them, ... Jamie Foxx is the antithesis of that.
I think it speaks to the greatness of the man that he truly gave me the gift of allowing me to tell the story warts and all, ... To be able to see the good, the bad, the light, the dark. And Ray Charles had a substantial dark side.
And it's a question of how far we're willing to go in order to let the ego shine, in order to let that beacon penetrate not only the local scene but the world.
I heard his story and I thought, 'My God, this is a great subject for a film,'
I had to go to Ray every year and apologize. And he was so wise in his way, he said, 'Taylor, don't worry, it will happen when it's ready to happen,'
If you are making a film about a very famous individual you live or die by the person that's going to play the main role, ... In this film I'm in big trouble because everyone knows what Ray Charles looks like. Everyone knows his movements, everyone knows his vocal patterns.
You'd be surprised how many movie stars still care about the work.
When I finish a film, I put it away and I never look at it again.