Talent Guide

Scott Coffey

  • Discipline:Director, Writer
  • Program Year:Screenwriting Lab 2004

Bio

Scott Coffey knows his craft from both sides of the camera from his work as an actor, producer, writer, and director.

He was raised in Kailua Hawaii, attended school in Rome, Italy, and lives in Portland, Oregon.

As an actor, he has appeared in numerous films including several John Hughes movies, Nicholas Kazan’s Dream Lover, David Lynch’s Mulholland Drive, and Shag, for which he was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Actor. Most recently he can be seen as Jack Rabbit in David Lynch’s Inland Empire and in Lynch’s online series Rabbits.

In 2004 Filmmaker Magazine named Coffey one of the 25 New Faces of Independent Film for his first short film Ellie Parker, which premiered at that year’s Sundance Film Festival. Naomi Watts starred as the title character. Coffey and Watts continued to film a series of shorts based on the same character and in 2005, the feature film version of Ellie Parker, starring Watts and Chevy Chase was an Official Selection of the 2005 Sundance Film Festival. The film also won the New American Cinema Award at the Seattle International Film Festival, and Coffey received the Breakthrough Writer/Director Award from Movieline’s Hollywood Life Magazine. The movie received rave reviews from The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Salon, Sight and Sound and Roger Ebert. Ebert and Roeper gave Ellie Parker “Two Thumbs Up.” The film was distributed in the US by Strand Releasing and is currently out on DVD.

Recently Coffey adapted the best-selling Lolly Winston novel Happiness Sold Separately for Fox Searchlight. Coffey will direct with Julia Roberts attached to star. His screen adaptation of Haruki Murakami’s All God’s Children Can Dance (aka K-Town Superfrog) screened as the opening night film of CineVegas and at the Deauville International Film Festival.

Coffey’s latest projects include music videos for Anya Marina’s Satellite Heart, for the Twilight New Moon soundtrack, Anya Marina’s Move Me, (Atlantic/Chop Shop, 2008), and Death Vessel’s Circa (Sub Pop 2009). His 2009 video for Handsome Furs’ I’m Confused (Sub Pop Records, 2009), was named the second best video on MTV’s Buzzworthy List and was on Spin Magazine’s 20 Best Videos of 2009. His video for Wolf Parade’s Yulia (Sub Pop Records, 2010) was named the best video of the year by Movieline.

Coffey’s next film will be Adult World which he will direct with Anonymous Content producing. Emma Roberts starts in Adult World. After Adult World, Coffey will direct Jupiter, which he will direct from his original screenplay. Jupiter will star Keanu Reeves.

Current Project

JUPITER (NARRATIVE FEATURE)

Logline

A young woman writer arrives in the seaside town of Jupiter, Florida to write about religion in modern America. With the help of the town's ensemble of lost characters, she searches for meaning through the prism of contemporary faith.