Rian Johnson and Bob Ducsay to receive Variety Creative Arts Collaborators Award at Middleburg Film Festival

Filmmaker Rian Johnson and his frequent collaborator, editor Bob Ducsay will receive the inaugural Variety Creative Collaborators Award, which will be presented at the Middleburg Film Festival taking place October 13-16. The award will celebrate their collaboration on films such as Looper, Star Wars: The Last Jedi, Knives Out and their upcoming film Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery, which will be screening at the festival.

The conversation will be held on Friday, October 14th with both filmmakers in attendance. Variety Senior Artisans editor Jazz Tangcay will moderate the career retrospective talk. Johnson and Ducsay will also be discussing their latest collaboration following a screening of Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery.

MFF Executive Director Susan Koch said, “We are thrilled to partner with Variety on this award and have the opportunity to celebrate the creative collaborations that are such an essential part of what makes great cinema. Rian Johnson and Bob Ducsay are the perfect team to receive the inaugural award for their many years of collaboration, most recently on the highly anticipated Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery which we are pleased to be screening at our festival.”

In Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery, the follow-up to the critically acclaimed 2019 murder mystery hit film, Daniel Craig returns as detective Benoit Blanc who time travels to Greece to uncover a fresh mystery involving a new cast of colorful suspects. Joining Craig are Edward Norton, Janelle Monáe, Dave Bautista, Kathryn Hahn, Leslie Odom Jr., Kate Hudson, Jessica Henwick and Madelyn Cline.

Ducsay received an ACE Eddie Awards nomination for his work on Knives Out, while Johnson was both Academy Award and BAFTA-nominated for his original screenplay.

Festival founder and Board Chair Sheila C. Johnson added, “From the beginning, the Middleburg Film Festival has been committed to showcasing behind-the-scenes artisans – whose craft and dedication are critical to bringing a director’s vision to the screen. This year, we’re delighted to join Variety in honoring two fantastic creative collaborators, who together have given us some very memorable films.”

While this year’s film slate, conversation guests and other honorees have yet to be announced, past festival guests and honorees include Kenneth Branagh, Noah Baumbach, Damien Chazelle, Kasi Lemmons, Greta Gerwig, Dakota Johnson, Sterling K. Brown, Terence Blanchard, Coleen Atwood, Diane Warren, Kris Bowers, Walter Murch, Rodrigo Prieto, Ari Wegner, among many others.

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Erik Anderson

Erik Anderson is the founder/owner and Editor-in-Chief of AwardsWatch and has always loved all things Oscar, having watched the Academy Awards since he was in single digits; making lists, rankings and predictions throughout the show. This led him down the path to obsessing about awards. Much later, he found himself in film school and the film forums of GoldDerby, and then migrated over to the former Oscarwatch (now AwardsDaily), before breaking off to create AwardsWatch in 2013.

He is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic, accredited by the Cannes Film Festival, Telluride Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival and more, is a member of the International Cinephile Society (ICS), The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics (GALECA), Hollywood Critics Association (HCA) and the International Press Academy. Among his many achieved goals with AwardsWatch, he has given a platform to underrepresented writers and critics and supplied them with access to film festivals and the industry and calls the Bay Area his home where he lives with his husband and son.

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