May 11, 2009

Leaving Las Vegas is an Academy Award winning film about an alcoholic and prostitute who pursue an unexpected relationship built on ignoring the other's vices. Mike Figgis, the acclaimed director and screenwriter, of the film which starred Nicolas Cage and Elizabeth Shue, will screen the film and do a Q&A session on May 13th at 7 PM in Bossone Auditorium. While Figgis' Leaving Las Vegas and Internal Affairs, with Richard Gere, have been successful films, Figgis is seen mainly as a Hollywood outsider. Leaving Las Vegas earned Figgis two Academy Award nominations for Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Director, as well as an Academy Award for Nicolas Cage (Best Actor) and an Academy Award nomination for Elizabeth Shue (Best Actress). Figgis is also a composer and wrote nearly a dozen songs for Leaving Las Vegas.

In recent years, Figgis has been incorporating innovative digital video technologies into his filmmaking with such films as The 4 Dreams of Miss X, Co/Ma and Timecode. He also directed for HBO's The Sopranos and an episode of the PBS documentary series The Blues, which was executive produced by Martin Scorsese. While on campus, Mike will spend three days with the Department of Cinema and Television and its Film & Video and Screenwriting & Playwriting programs conducting workshops.