Ridley Scott in 2012
Ridley Scott (born 30 November 1937 in South Shields, Tyne and Wear) is an English film director and producer.
Initially Scott wanted to join Army (his elder brother Frank had already joined the Merchant Navy) but his father encouraged him to develop his artistic talents instead and so he went to West Hartlepool College of Art and then London's Royal College of Art, where he helped found the film department.
He joined BBC in 1962 as trainee set designer working on several high profile shows. He attended a trainee director's course, while he was there and his first directing job was an episode of the prestigious BBC series Task Force Police (1962), Task Force Police: Error of Judgement (1965).
After being for ten year in the advertising business, he began working with producer David Puttmann in the 1970s developing ideas for feature films. Their first joint endeavour, The Duellists (1977) won the Jury Prize for Best First Work at Cannes in 1977 and was nominated for the Palm d'Or, more than successfully launching Scott's feature film career. He also filmed Blade Runner (1982), Legend (1985), Thelma and Louise (1991), G.I.Jane (1997), Gladiator (2000) and Robin hood (2010). Scott has been nominated for three Academy Awards for Directing (for Thelma and Louise, Gladiator and Black Hawk Down), plus two Golden Globe and two BAFTA Awards.
He became famous for the movie Alien (1979), which ignited the Alien franchise. He also filmed the movie Prometheus (2012), which is a prequel to Alien.