Morgan Neville

Morgan Neville is one of the few American nonfiction filmmakers to have won an Oscar, a Grammy and an Independent Spirit Award (as well as three Emmy nominations), making nonfiction films for both theatrical release and television on such American cultural figures as Brian Wilson, Leiber & Stoller, Burt Bacharach, Fred Rogers, Muddy Waters, Johnny Cash, Sam Phillips, Hank Williams, James Taylor, Carole King, Iggy Pop, Gore Vidal, William F. Buckley, Yo-Yo Ma, Orson Welles, Anthony Bourdain, Pharrell Williams, Steve Martin, Jack Clement, Pearl Jam, James Brown, Ray Charles, Wayne White, The Rolling Stones, Keith Richards, Paul McCartney, Chelsea Handler, illustrator Christoph Niemann, architect Bjarke Ingels, “material ecology” designer-artist Neri Oxman and art institutions ranging from the Ferus Gallery to Stax Records and Shangri-La recording studio.

Neville shifted from journalism to nonfiction filmmaking with his first feature, Shotgun Freeway: Drives Through Lost L.A. (1995), covering many aspects of Neville’s Los Angeles hometown, with Buck Henry, David Hockney, Bert Corona, Buddy Collette, Joan Didion, James Ellroy, Frank Wilkinson, and Mike Davis, and premiering at the South by Southwest Film Festival.

Neville continued to explore Los Angeles with his fascinating The Cool School: How LA Learned to Love Modern Art (2008), co-written and co-produced by Kristine McKenna, which was a feature-length survey of revolutionary artists shown at the city’s legendary Ferus Gallery including Ed Keinholz, Ed Ruscha, Wallace Berman, Ed Moses, Robert Irwin, and Craig Kauffman, and narrated by Jeff Bridges. Neville made his first feature documentary on music with Troubadours (2011), which looked at the careers of James Taylor and Carole King and premiered at Sundance.

Morgan Neville directed one of his most acclaimed feature nonfiction films with his exploration of the lives and work of background singers, 20 Feet from Stardom (2013), including interview segments with music executive Lou Adler and pop artists Sheryl Crow, Mick Jagger, Bette Midler, Bruce Springsteen, Sting and Steve Wonder, and won Neville an Oscar for best documentary feature after premiering at the Sundance Film Festival and released by The Weinstein Company for a $5.8 million gross.

Neville was director/writer of Best of Enemies: Buckley vs. Vidal (2015), examining ten debates between Gore Vidal and William F. Buckley aired in 1968 on ABC News which ushered in the era of TV punditry, with the voices of John Lithgow and Kelsey Grammer and on-camera subjects Christopher Hitchens, Dick Cavett and James Wolcott, and which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival before a Magnolia Pictures release.

Neville returned to music as director/producer with his film (co-produced with BBC Four) on cellist Yo-Yo Ma’s collaborations with Asian musicians in The Music of Strangers: Yo-Yo Ma and the Silk Road Ensemble (2015), featuring Kinan Azmeh, Kayhan Kalhor, Man Wu, Bobby McFerrin and Osvaldo Golijov, premiering at the Toronto Film Festival. Neville turned to an entirely different subject for his next theatrical release, the outstanding portrait of Fred Rogers and the creation of Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood (1968-2001), Won’t You Be My Neighbor? (2018), premiering at the Sundance Film Festival, released by Focus Features (to a fabulous $22.8 million gross), and winning the best documentary Indie Spirit award.

Morgan Neville began making nonfiction features for streaming release, most notably They’ll Love Me When I’m Dead (2018), an interesting exploration of the creative struggles plaguing Orson Welles’s final film, The Other Side of the Wind (2018), and which premiered at the Venice Film Festival before its Netflix release. Neville as director/producer profiled another legendary American figure, the late chef-author Anthony Bourdain, with Roadrunner: A Film About Anthony Bourdain (2021), garnering some controversy for the use of an A.I.-generated voice for Bourdain and grossing $5.5 million for Focus Features after premiering at the Tribeca Film Festival.

Neville was director/producer of his first animated documentary, Piece by Piece (2024), a biographical portrait of Pharrell Williams’s life and career which animates Lego pieces and includes on-camera appearances by Neville, Williams, Gwen Stefani, Kendrick Lamar, Timbaland, Justin Timberlake, Busta Rhymes, Jay-Z and Snoop Dogg, and released wide by Focus Features after premiering at the Telluride Film Festival. Neville was then director/producer of the PolyGram Entertainment-backed Man on the Run (date to be announced), surveying the period of Paul McCartney’s music career from the breakup of The Beatles to the formation of the band Wings with wife Linda McCartney.