Toronto/CMEDIA: Cameron Bailey, CEO of TIFF, is thrilled to announce that Academy Award®–winning filmmaker Sam Mendes, director of Empire of Light is the recipient of the TIFF Ebert Director Award recognizing filmmakers who exemplified greatness in their careers.
Presented by BVLGARI, the TIFF Tribute Awards will return to an in-person gala fundraiser during the 47th edition of the Toronto International Film Festival on Sunday, September 11 at Fairmont Royal York Hotel.
Canadian Premiere of Mendes’ most recent work Empire of Light, which he wrote, directed, and produced would be presented by TIFF during its 47th edition.
A powerful and poignant story about human connection and the magic of cinema, Searchlight Pictures’ Empire of Light is set in an English seaside town in the early 1980s.
Apart from Starring Olivia Colman, Micheal Ward, Tom Brooke, Tanya Moodie, Hannah Onslow, Crystal Clarke, with Toby Jones and Colin Firth, Mendes also teams up with award-winning cinematographer Roger Deakins, who was also a TIFF Tribute Award recipient in 2019.
Named after legendary film critic Roger Ebert, TIFF Ebert Director Award marks an evolution of the Festival’s Roger Ebert Golden Thumb Award, past recipients of which were celebrated visionaries such as Martin Scorsese, Claire Denis, Ava DuVernay, Wim Wenders, and the late Agnès Varda.
Past recipients who received the Award since the TIFF Tribute Awards were introduced include Denis Villeneuve (2021), Chloé Zhao (2020), and Taika Waititi (2019).
Mendes joins the ensemble of My Policeman, the recently announced list of 2022 TIFF Tribute Award honourees, who will receive the TIFF Tribute Award for Performance presented by Polestar. More information on the 2022 TIFF Tribute Awards event and this year’s honourees will follow in the coming weeks.
Honoring the film industry’s outstanding contributors and their achievements, the TIFF Tribute Awards recognize leading industry members, acting talent, directorial expertise, new talent, and a below-the-line artist and creator.
The Awards event also serves as TIFF’s largest annual fundraiser to support TIFF’s Every Story fund, which promotes diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging in film and TIFF’s core mission to transform the way people see the world through film.
SAM MENDES: BIOGRAPHY
Founder and director of Donmar Warehouse in London for 10 years, Sam Mendes was also the founding director of Neal Street Productions and The Bridge Project.
With his work being seen at the National Theatre, RSC, Royal Court, Old Vic, Young Vic, BAM, the West End, and on Broadway, included films, American Beauty, Road to Perdition, Jarhead, Revolutionary Road, Away We Go, Skyfall, Spectre, and 1917.
Besides being the recipient of Academy Award for Best Director and Best Picture and three other Academy Award nominations, five BAFTA Awards, three Golden Globe Awards, three Tony Awards, five Olivier Awards, the Olivier Special Award, three Evening Standard Awards, two Directors Guild of America Awards, the PGA award, the Jason Robards Award, and the Hamburg Shakespeare Prize, he has also won the Director’s Guild Award for lifetime achievement.
Being an Honorary Fellow of the National Film and Television School, and a fellow of Peterhouse, Cambridge. he was also made a CBE in 2000 and knighted in 2020 for services to drama.
#TIFFEbertDirectorAward; #SamMendes; #EmpireofLight; #BVLGARI
