Essential Actor / Director Partnerships: Owen Wilson and Wes Anderson

In a special feature running all this week, Alex Williams counts down his Essential Actor / Director Partnerships...

Owen Wilson and Wes Anderson

Bottle Rocket (1996)
Rushmore (1998) [co-wrote but not featured]
The Royal Tenenbaums (2001)
The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004)
The Darjeeling Limited (2007)

As well as working for a director on screen, some actors contribute in other ways. Owen Wilson first met Wes Anderson when they were both studying at the University of Texas. They quickly began working together and the result was 1996's Bottle Rocket, which was an expansion on a short film they had made a couple of years earlier.

Revolving around a cast of misfits, Dignan (Owen Wilson), Anthony (Luke Wilson) and Bob (Bob Musgrave) plan the robbery of a cold storage building's safe. With Dignan plotting their robbery as a glorious, overblown heist of the century, the film builds towards its inevitable outcome with a soft affection for its bewildered protagonists. Dignan is the infectiously enthusiastic wannabe and, with Wilson, director Anderson found an actor capable of transmitting foolhardy bravado with a touching insecurity in equal measures. This was transmitted perfectly in the penultimate scene to their first feature. Facing almost certain capture by the police, Dignan responds;

“They'll never catch me, man... Because I'm fuckin' innocent.”

Wilson went on to co-write Rushmore with Anderson, again to much critical acclaim. During this time, Wilson was being cast in mainstream fare of questionable quality such as Anaconda and The Haunting.

With 2001's The Royal Tenenbaums, actor and director again collaborated on the screenplay. Wilson took the role of Eli Cash – a drug addicted writer and family friend of the Tenebaums with a raging, yet easily bruised, ego. Framed by the voice of Alec Baldwin as the narrator, The Royal Tenenbaums featured Owen Wilson alongside his brother Luke and a stellar cast including Gene Hackman, Bill Murray, Angelica Huston, Danny Glover and Gwyneth Paltrow.

In the film, Wilson's Cash functions as the flipside to his brother Luke's character, Richie. The two men are in the midst of life crises. Eli expresses his fears by taking drugs, behaving recklessly and emotionally manipulating people. Richie exists in a vacuum of limited expression, hiding behind his sunglasses and long hair. Of the two, Eli seems the more likely to end up hurt or worse, but it is Richie who attempts to take his own life.


With Eli, Owen Wilson captures a person who, whilst being a drug addict and depressive, still values life. His odd behaviours and outlandish persona all form part of an insanely insecure individual. Anderson treats Eli with shots that make him seem isolated and lonely, often filmed in wide shots, it only adds to the character's seeming loneliness.

Riffing on the idiosyncrasies of its oddball characters, the film managed to maintain a melancholy air of loss and regret whilst providing laughs and creating an eccentric, endearing world with Anderson and Wilson nominated for the 2002 best screenplay Oscar which eventually went to Julian Fellowes for Gosford Park.

The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou was released in 2004 with Bill Murray as the eponymous deep sea adventurer of the title. Wilson featured as Ned, Zissou's would-be son and pilot, with Angelica Huston, Cate Blanchett, Willem Dafoe and Jeff Goldblum also featuring. Wilson played Ned as a softer, more likeable character than Eli Cash with an earnestness that was a perfect foil to Murray's brasher father figure.

2007 saw the release of The Darjeeling Limited, which followed brothers Francis (Wilson), Peter (Adrien Brody) and Jack (Jason Schwartzman) as they traverse India on the titular train to see their mother, played by Angelica Huston, who lives in an abbey. Wilson, as Francis, had the role of the overbearing older brother, much to his brother's chagrin.

Related...

Essential Actor / Director Partnerships: Klaus Kinski and Werner Herzog
Essential Actor / Director Partnerships: Kurt Russell and John Carpenter
Essential Actor / Director Partnerships: Steve Martin and Carl Reiner
Essential Actor / Director Partnerships: Molly Ringwald and John Hughes

Alex Williams

Essentials Archive