Peter Medak

Biography: A trainee at Britain's AB-Pathe in the late 1950s, Medak became an assistant editor in the 1960s and was second-unit director on the espionage films Funeral In Berlin and Fathom. He also began directing for television in the mid '60s. In 1968 he helmed his first theatrical feature, the role-playing psychodrama Negatives. In the early '70s he scored with his adaptations of two memorable black comedies: Peter Nichols' mercy-killing tale A Day In The Death Of Joe Egg and Peter Barnes' satire of insanity among England's nobility, The Ruling Class. More ordinary comedies dominated Medak's later films, but he won acclaim for his fact-based crime dramas of the early '90s, The Krays and Let Him Have It.