Jill Sprecher

Born: Madison, Wisconsin, USA

The writer and director attracted critical acclaim for her debut feature Clockwatchers, a satire of corporate culture.

After studying philosophy and literature at the University of Wisconsin, Sprecher studied cinema at New York University.

Her first job was as an assistant on the 1983 cult favorite Liquid Sky and she went on to take a series of movie production jobs.

Supplementing her film income with temp work, she used material derived from her office work to c-write the Clockwatchers screenplay with her sister Karen.

The movie, starring Lisa Kudrow, Toni Collette and Parker Posey, was a success at the Sundance Festival.

She used £15,000 prize money for Clockwatchers from the Turin Film Festival to begin work on Thirteen Conversations About One Thing, again co-written with her sister.

With REM's Michael Stipe on board as a producer and a cast including Matthew McConaughey and Alan Arkin, the movie opened to critical acclaim in 2001.