Jean-Marc Vallée, the director and producer behind the popular HBO series “Big Little Lies,” as well as his 2013 drama “Dallas Buyers Club,” which received several Oscar nods, has died at the age of 58.
Bumble Ward, the agent for Vallée, announced Sunday that he died suddenly in his cabin outside Quebec City over the weekend.
Reese Witherspoon, Nicole Kidman, Amy Adams, and Jake Gyllenhaal have all worked with him during the last decade, and his naturalistic style has won him praise.
He has also directed Emily Blunt in “The Young Victoria” (2009) and became a hot name in Hollywood after the epic success of “Dallas Buyers Club,” which earned six Academy Awards nominations, including best picture.
He frequently employed natural light and hand-held cameras, allowing the cast a degree of flexibility in ad libbing and moving about within the confines of a scene’s setting. In 2014,’s “Wild,” which was filmed on the Pacific Coast Trail, the crew roamed up and down it.
“They may go anywhere they choose,” Canadian director David Cronenberg said of his cast in a 2014 interview with The Associated Press. “Giving importance to storytelling, emotion, and characters is one thing I try not to do. I don’t like interfering too much. I prefer not to cut performances when possible. We often remarked,
Vallée has collaborated with Witherspoon on a number of projects since their collaboration on “Wild,” including the first season of “Big Little Lies.” He returned to HBO in 2018 to direct Adams in “Sharp Objects,” which also aired on the network. Vallée won DGA honors for both works.
In Dallas Buyers Club, a small-time electrician contracts AIDS in 1986. After being turned away from the hospital in a homophobic Texas town, he starts buying his own drugs from a corrupt pharmacist and selling them himself to support himself and his fellow victims. With the help of a transgender friend, he tracks down other AIDS patients and smuggles in unapproved drugs from all over the world with help from sympathetic doctors. He also tries to find meaning in his quest for survival by making connections with women along the way.
The film was written by Craig Borten and Melisa Wallack and is based on a true story that took place in 1985. The director Jean-Marc Vallée filmed this movie using natural light and hand-held cameras, resulting in a documentary feel. This style of filming has earned him comparisons to director Robert Altman. According to Dallas Buyers Club producer Robbie Brenner, Vallée was drawn to the project because he “loves stories with big themes”.
Matthew McConaughey said about the movie: “Dallas Buyers Club is an AIDS drama about Ron Woodroof (played by Matthew McConaughey) who was given 30 days to live after he got HIV in the 1980s. This true story had some light moments, some dark moments, some pretty awesome, awesome people and characters that are still with us today.”
The film depicts the fight of Woodroof, who is diagnosed with HIV in the 1980s. He fights for his health against a prejudiced society and negligent government. These are the very real challenges he faced at the beginning of AIDS epidemic. The movie features Jared Leto as Rayon, a transsexual woman whose identity Ron struggles to accept.
