Steven Caple Jr.

Steven Caple Jr. is a fast-rising writer-director who has moved from indie and short filmmaking into big-budget productions. After winning HBO’s short film competition in 2013 for his USC-produced film, A Different Tree (2013), as well as five other shorts during the period of 2011 to 2014—and after a few episodic TV directing gigs—Caple Jr. made his debut feature as writer-director with the crime drama, The Land (2016), set in Caple Jr’s hometown of Cleveland, with Jorge Lendeborg Jr., Moises Arias, Michael K. Williams, Kim Coates, Linda Emond, Erykah Badu, and Machine Gun Kelly, and which premiered in Sundance’s NEXT section and was released by IFC Films.

Steven Caple Jr. followed the advice of indie-turned-studio writer-director Ryan Coogler and successfully jumped into mainstream Hollywood as director (and uncredited co-writer) of Warner Bros.’ sequel, Creed II (2018), starring Michael B. Jordan, Sylvester Stallone, Tessa Thompson, Wood Harris, Phylicia Rashad, Florian Munteanu, and Dolph Lundgren, grossing a quadruple of $50 million costs with a take of $214 million.

After more TV directing assignments (including the Transformers: Earthspark series in 2022), Caple Jr. directed the $200 million mega-sequel, Transformers: Rise of the Beasts (2023), with live-action actors Anthony Ramos, Dominique Fishback, and Luna Lauren Velez, and voice actors Peter Cullen, Ron Perlman, Peter Dinklage, Pete Davidson, Michelle Yeoh, and Colman Domingo.