Benedictine College Event Features Award-Winning Director Whit Stillman

Oscar-Nominated Film ‘Metropolitan’ to be Screened

Benedictine College is pleased to welcome award-winning screenwriter and director Whit Stillman to campus on Monday, November 7, at 7:00 p.m. in O’Malley-McAllister Auditorium. Those in attendance will get to watch his Oscar-nominated film Metropolitan and engage with him in a Q&A session after the screening. Sponsored by the Honors Program, the Gregorian Fellows, and the Arts and Convocation Committee, this unique event is free and open to the public.

Stillman, an American writer, director, actor and producer, is known for his 1990 film Metropolitan, for which he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. Considered to be one of the best American independent films of the 1990s, the unexpected success of Metropolitan garnered Stillman a lot of attention and a cult following.

The film is centered around the lives of a group of wealthy young socialites during the debutante season in Manhattan, New York, and one of the character’s romantic misadventures while he’s trying to fit in. Ultimately, the underlying message is a story that leads to the tenderness of adolescent anxiety. Fashioned with Stillman’s clever and hilariously highbrow insights, the dialogue in this one hour and 38 minute film illustrates a writing style that has been likened to that of filmmaker Woody Allen.

Stillman, a Harvard graduate, wrote the Metropolitan screenplay while leading a New York illustration agency between 1984 and 1988. To pay for this first film, Stillman sold rights to his apartment and raised money from friends and family. He used exclusive interior locations that were loaned to him by family friends and relatives. Grossing $3 million on a budget of around $225,000, this film was a financial success.

Founded in 1858, Benedictine College is a Catholic, Benedictine, residential, liberal arts college located on the bluffs above the Missouri River in Atchison, Kansas. The school is proud to have been named one of America’s Best Colleges by U.S. News & World Report as well as one of the top Catholic colleges in the nation by First Things magazine and the Newman Guide. It prides itself on outstanding academics, extraordinary faith life, strong athletic programs, and an exceptional sense of community and belonging. Benedictine College has a mission to educate men and women within a community of faith and scholarship.