Breakthrough director Ryan Murphy

Hollywood Awards honoree

By STEPHEN SCHAEFER

It was 1997 when Murphy hit Daily Variety's front page with the news that Steven Spielberg had optioned his script, "Why Can't I Be Audrey Hepburn." "All you need is one yes," says the writer-turned-helmer. "There can be lots of no's, but then the one yes."

Four years ago, right after his series "Popular" ended and he shot the "Nip/Tuck" pilot, Murphy read reviews of Augusten Burroughs' memoir, "Running with Scissors," only to find, "They didn't want me to meet with him because Oscar-winning directors were circling it. I demanded a meeting with Augusten and I guess they thought I was so crazed they said yes."

Now with Brad Pitt as a producer, "Scissors" stars Annette Bening, Brian Cox, Gwyneth Paltrow, Joseph Fiennes and Alec Baldwin.

Murphy was intimidated by the talent but not the job. "The thing about being a movie director and showrunner for a series is they're the same gig: The buck stops with you and you have to have leadership. I'd had a couple of years of rallying the troops mode and this felt similar to me."

Of Bening, he says, "It is the most difficult role of her career, playing a bipolar manic depressive lesbian bisexual poet. She was incredibly well prepared."

Next up, the kid who was president of the Meryl Streep Fan Club at Indiana U. will direct Streep -- and Bening and Sharon Stone and Paltrow -- in the women-of-Watergate drama "Dirty Tricks."