Along with contemporaries like Sam Mendes, Deborah Warner and Matthew Warchus, British stage director Stephen Daldry moved from the theater to film. After spending some 15 years honing his craft and amassing numerous accolades, he stepped behind the cameras to helm the feature "Billy Elliot" (2000), a drama about a preteen boy struggling with grief over his mother's premature death and finding a measure of solace in dancing.

The son of a singer and a bank manager, Daldry spent part of his formative years as a member of a youth drama group in Taunton, England. While at Sheffield University, he