Alexander Payne is an American movie director and screenwriter. He is best known for his work in the films “Election,” “Sideways” and “The Descendants.” He has been nominated for Best Director and Adapted Screenplay for two Academy Awards.

His 1994 film, Citizen Ruth, was also nominated at the Cannes Film Festival in 1995 for its screenplay.

Payne attended Stanford University from 1979 to 1981, majoring in English while taking art history classes. He graduated from the University of Oregon in 1984 with a Bachelor of Science degree in journalism, which he was not happy with; he wanted to go into painting instead. He wrote and directed his first short film during this time.

Before becoming a full-time director, Payne worked as a production assistant on F.I.S.T., which starred Robert De Niro and Donald Sutherland, among others. He also wrote several unproduced scripts in the early 1980s, including one about a small town flooded by oil and one about an English man who “never felt he fit in.” He wanted to direct The Right Stuff but did not get the job because the studio thought he was too young (Payne was born in 1954). Payne got his directing start at a 2004 screening of his film sideways in Telluride, Colorado.

Payne, a native of Omaha, Nebraska, currently lives in Los Angeles with his wife, actress Sandra Oh. He has been married to her since 1997 (they met on the set of “Sideways”). They have two children: son Alexander Payne Jr. and daughter Claudia Payne. On November 3, 2012, Oh gave birth to their second child, a daughter named Greta Simone Payne.

Payne supports the Film Foundation, James L. Brooks, Robert De Niro, Martin Scorsese, and Steven Spielberg. The foundation’s goal is to protect and preserve motion picture history.

In 2006, he was listed on Variety’s 10 Producers to Watch list. Payne has directed two films set in the Pacific Northwest: “About Schmidt” (2002) and “Nebraska” (2013). He also made the short film “Marry Me” (2015), which stars Jonah Hill and Emma Thompson.

Before Payne was a film director, he wrote a play called “The Cottington Men,” which was performed in London in the early 1980s. This play has since been filmed with many actors such as Patrick Bergin, Robyn Nevin, Dougray Scott, and Rutger Hauer starring.