Of the casting, Yates said that he "wanted to use non-actors to tell the story, to create a reality. Yates said that even though The Way We Live Now was "a very big production" and "enormous fun to do", Rank was an opportunity to "shake all that off" and "get back to roots". One year later, Yates attended the 56th BAFTA Awards with a British Academy Film Award nomination for Best Short Film for the fourteen-minute production, Rank, which expressed the social elements of racism, friendship and adolescence through the story of a street gang that cross Glasgow to witness the arrival of a group of Somali refugees.
Yates shared the British Academy Television Award for Best Drama Serial with screenwriter Andrew Davies and producer Nigel Stafford-Clark at the 2002 BAFTA Awards. Yates returned to television in 2000 to direct the episodes of Greed, Envy and Lust for the BBC miniseries The Sins, starring Pete Postlethwaite, as well as The Way We Live Now, the four-part television adaptation of the novel of the same name by Anthony Trollope. It starred Stephen Fry and Robert Hardy and was shot on location in Merseyside and on the Isle of Man. The film, which was shown at the Edinburgh International Film Festival, was written by Joe Fisher and based on the true events of the Tichborne Case. Yates directed his fifth short film Punch before making his feature film debut in 1998 with the release of the independent historical-drama film The Tichborne Claimant. The programme followed media personalities Russell Grant, Honor Blackman and Pam Ayres visiting and exploring the South Coast towns of Brighton, Eastbourne and Weymouth. įrom 1994 to 1995, Yates directed several episodes of the ITV police procedural The Bill before directing and producing three episodes of the television documentary Tale of Three Seaside Towns alongside producer Alistair Clarke. After graduating in 1992, Yates directed an episode of the film studies programme Moving Pictures. He also made his fourth short film, Good Looks, which was presented at the Chicago International Film Festival. Before completing film school, he began to direct, produce and write the screenplay to the dramatic short The Weaver's Wife. It contributed towards Yates's acceptance into the National Film and Television School in 1989 and led to the BBC hiring him to direct Oranges and Lemons, a short drama film in 1991. The film entered the festival circuit where it was named Best Short Film at the San Francisco International Film Festival.
In 1988, Yates made his first film When I Was a Girl in Swindon. The National Film and Television School, where Yates trained as a director Career Television and film career (1988–2005) He graduated with a BA in Government in 1987. While at the University of Essex, Yates formed the Film and Video Production Society. Yates said that he "used to skive off college all the time" and never expected to join university before being surprised by his A-Level exam results. He attended Grange Park High School, St Helens College and then the University of Essex. One such film, The Ghost Ship, was shot on board the vessel where his uncle worked as a cook. He used this to shoot various films in which his friends and family featured. Yates's mother bought him a Super 8mm camera.
Raised in the village of Rainhill, Yates was inspired to pursue a career in filmmaking after watching Steven Spielberg's 1975 movie Jaws.
2.4 Fantastic Beasts series (2016–2022)ĭavid was born on 8 October 1963 in St Helens, Lancashire, England.He has had a close partnership with Warner Bros.
Yates is a founding member of Directors UK. His credits include the six-part political thriller State of Play (2003), for which he won the Directors Guild of Great Britain Award for Outstanding Directorial Achievement, the adult two-part documentary drama Sex Traffic (2004) and the Emmy Award-winning television film The Girl in the Café (2005). Yates directed various short films and became a television director early in his career. His work on the Harry Potter series brought him critical and commercial success along with accolades, such as the British Academy Britannia Award for Excellence in Directing. He is best known for directing the later four films in the Harry Potter series and the first three films of its prequel series, Fantastic Beasts. David Yates (born 8 October 1963) is an English film director, producer and writer, who has directed feature films, short films, and television productions.