First earning his spurs as an assistant director on mentor Robert Altman's "The Long Goodbye" - Altman would act as producer on many of Rudolph's projects - Alan Rudolph has weaved his own idiosyncratic way through Hollywood's precarious maze.
Rudolph's talent for witty dialogue, off-kilter reality, and free-form large scale interactions first came to the fore with 1976's "Welcome To LA", which also established Rudolph's links with actors such as Geraldine Chaplin and Keith Carradine, who were to feature in much of his best work. The follow-up "Remember My Name" (1978) was a noir inflected update of the melodramas of the 40s, notable - even Rudolph's weaker pictures are elevated by their composition - for its stunning photography.
Rudolph became known as a director who could work quickly and cheaply and so lesser studio pics such as "Endangered Species" (1982) and the likable "Songwriter" (1984) followed before he hit his creative peak. "Choose Me" (1984), widely seen as his best work, was an ineffable blend of realism and jazz-like rhapsody - further Rudolph hallmarks - which encapsulated Rudolph's preoccupation with eccentrics in a world gone bad. "Trouble In Mind" (1985), was an equally charming if harder edged work, notable for bizarre hairstyles and a rare sans drag performance from Divine. "The Moderns" (1988), a suitably beguiling look at art forgery in 1920s Paris was a fitting end to the decade.
Next, a couple of disappointments: "Love At Large" (1990) and "Mortal Thoughts" (1991), in which one could sense Rudolph's lack of commitment. "Equinox" (1992), a doppelganger picture par excellence, was a well-timed return to form which left Rudolph's select club of admirers salivating at the prospect of his upcoming Dorothy Parker biopic, "Mrs Parker and the Vicious Circle". Armed with his eye for detail, his witty dialogue, and a towering turn from Jennifer Jason Leigh, Rudolph didn鹿't disappoint.
Sadly subsequent efforts - "Afterglow" (1998) excepted - like the misfiring "Breakfast of Champions" (2000) and the upcoming screwball comedy "Trixie" (2000) have been poor, leading fervent detractors to bemoan his lapses into narrative incoherence and downright pretension. Given his track record however, one hopes that this true maverick of the industry will strike another rich vein of form once again.
