Alexander Payne

Alexander Payne born February 10 1961 is an Oscarwinning filmmaker whose work has helped define modernday American cinema He is best known for the features Election 1999 Sideways 2004 The Descendants 2011 About Schmidt 2002 Nebraska 2013 and The Holdovers 2023 His movies have garnered a total of 24 Academy Award nominations including four times for Best Picture and three times for Best Director He has won two Oscars for Best Adapted Screenplay Sideways The Descendants and two of his films have won the Golden Globe for Best Picture His most recent film The Holdovers earned a Best Supporting Actress Oscar for DaVine Joy Randolph Five of his movies were shot at least partially in Nebraska where he continues to live dividing his time between there and Los Angeles An Omaha native Payne studied History and Spanish Literature at Stanford before earning an MFA in Film at UCLA He serves on the boards of the Telluride Film Festival and The Film Foundation