Jacob Stacey Schreier (born 1981) is an American director. He was a founding member of

Waverly Films Waverly Films is a Brooklyn based group of filmmakers who met at NYU and are named after a nearby diner. The group is Duncan Skiles, Christopher Ford, Jeff Kaplan, Ben Dickinson, Jon Watts, Jake Schreier, and Aaron Wesner. They usually work with c ...

, a

Brooklyn Brooklyn is a Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City located at the westernmost end of Long Island in the New York (state), State of New York. Formerly an independent city, the borough is coextensive with Kings County, one of twelv ...

-based filmmaking collective, and joined Park Pictures in 2006, releasing his first feature film ''

Robot & Frank ''Robot & Frank'' is a 2012 American science fiction comedy-drama film directed by Jake Schreier from a screenplay by Christopher D. Ford. The film stars Frank Langella, Susan Sarandon, Peter Sarsgaard, James Marsden, and Liv Tyler. ''Robot & ...

'' in 2012. In 2015, he released ''

Paper Towns Paper Towns may refer to: * ''Paper Towns'' (novel), a 2008 novel by John Green * ''Paper Towns'' (film), a 2015 film based on the novel * ''Paper Towns'' (soundtrack), the soundtrack to the film * Paper towns or phantom settlements, settlemen ...

'', an adaptation of the 2008 novel of the same name by

John Green John Michael Green (born August 24, 1977) is an American author and YouTuber. His books have more than 50 million copies in print worldwide, including ''The Fault in Our Stars'' (2012), which is one of the List of best-selling books#Bet ...

, and directed the 2025

Marvel Studios Marvel Studios, LLC, formerly known as Marvel Films, is an American film and television production company. Marvel Studios is the creator of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), a media franchise and shared universe of films and television ser ...

superhero film ''

Thunderbolts* ''Thunderbolts*'' is a 2025 American superhero film based on Marvel Comics featuring the team Thunderbolts (comics), Thunderbolts. Produced by Marvel Studios and distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures, it is List of Marvel Cinemat ...

''.

Early life

Born in

Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Anglo-Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland, Cali ...

, Jake Schreier attended the

New York University Tisch School of the Arts The New York University Tisch School of the Arts (commonly referred to as Tisch) is the performing, cinematic, and media arts school of New York University. Founded on August 17, 1965, as the School of the Arts at New York University, Tisch ...

. After graduating, he directed music videos, including one for

Francis and the Lights Francis and the Lights is an American music project created by Francis Farewell Starlite. The term "and the Lights" refers both to the lights on a stage and pixels on a computer screen. Francis Farewell Starlite (born Abe Morre Katz-Milder, Jun ...

, a performer/songwriter with whom Schreier also played

keyboard Keyboard may refer to: Text input * Keyboard, part of a typewriter * Computer keyboard ** Keyboard layout, the software control of computer keyboards and their mapping ** Keyboard technology, computer keyboard hardware and firmware Music * Mus ...

for several years. He also directed commercials for products such as

Absolut Vodka Absolut Vodka is a brand of vodka, produced near Åhus, in southern Sweden. Absolut is a part of the French group Pernod Ricard. Pernod Ricard bought Absolut for €5.63 billion in 2008 (equivalent to € in ) from the Swedish state. Absolut ...

and

Verizon Verizon Communications Inc. ( ), is an American telecommunications company headquartered in New York City. It is the world's second-largest telecommunications company by revenue and its mobile network is the largest wireless carrier in the ...

phones. Together with his friends from college, he co-founded the film collective

and continued to collaborate on film projects for television and the web.

Film career

In 2006, Schreier signed with Park Pictures, a commercial and film

production company A production company, production house or production studio is a studio that creates works in the fields of performing arts, new media art, film, television show, television, radio, comics, interactive arts, video games, websites, music, and video ...

, and worked on a number of

advertising campaigns An advertising campaign or marketing campaign is a series of advertisement messages that share a single idea and theme which make up an marketing strategy, integrated marketing marketing communications, communication (IMC). An IMC is a platform i ...

and commercials; he was noted for his work and appeared in the “Best New Directors” list of '' Creativity Magazine'' and other advertising industry magazines. In 2012, he released his first feature film, ''

'', based on the screenplay by his Tisch classmate and friend Christopher Ford. The film won the

Alfred P. Sloan Prize The Alfred P. Sloan Prize is an award given each year, starting in 2003, to a film at the Sundance Film Festival The Sundance Film Festival is an annual film festival organized by the Sundance Institute. It is the largest independent film fe ...

at the

Sundance Film Festival The Sundance Film Festival is an annual film festival organized by the Sundance Institute. It is the largest independent film festival in the United States, with 423,234 combined in-person and online viewership in 2023. The festival has acted ...

, for best feature film that focuses on science or technology as a theme, tying with the

Kashmiri Kashmiri may refer to: * People or things related to the Kashmir Valley or the broader region of Kashmir * Kashmiris, an ethnic group native to the Kashmir Valley * Kashmiri language, the language of the Kashmiris ethnic group People with the nam ...

film ''

Valley of Saints The Valley of Saints is located in Khuldabad, a town in the Aurangabad district of Maharashtra, India. Several Sufi saints of the Chishti Order chose to reside in Khuldabad in the fourteenth century. The dargah of Muntajib al-Din (Khuldabad), a ...

''. ''Robot & Frank'' earned Schreier critical acclaim for his feature directorial debut. ''

Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...

'' film critic Kenneth Turan called it "exceptionally polished for a first-time effort", and ''

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. The magazine was first known fo ...

'' gave it three out of four stars. He also directed the

film adaptation A film adaptation transfers the details or story of an existing source text, such as a novel, into a feature film. This transfer can involve adapting most details of the source text closely, including characters or plot points, or the original sou ...

of the

book, ''

'', which was released on July 24, 2015. In 2021, frequent collaborator

Chance the Rapper Chancelor Johnathan Bennett (born April 16, 1993), known professionally as Chance the Rapper, is an American rapper. Born and raised in Chicago, Illinois, he released his debut mixtape '' 10 Day'' (2012) during one of his high school suspension ...

released '' Magnificent Coloring World'', a concert film made from special performance footage Schrier directed in 2016. An international

distribution Distribution may refer to: Mathematics *Distribution (mathematics), generalized functions used to formulate solutions of partial differential equations *Probability distribution, the probability of a particular value or value range of a varia ...

agreement with

AMC Theatres AMC Entertainment Holdings, Inc. (doing business as AMC Theatres, originally an abbreviation for American Multi-Cinema; often referred to simply as AMC) is an American movie theater chain founded in Kansas City, Missouri, and now headquartered ...

and Park Pictures for the film was made, marking the first time an individual recording artist has distributed a film exclusively through AMC. In June 2022, Schreier was hired to direct the

superhero

Marvel Cinematic Universe The Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) is an American media franchise and shared universe centered on List of Marvel Cinematic Universe films, a series of superhero films produced by Marvel Studios. The films are based on characters that appe ...

(MCU) film ''

''. The film received highly positive reviews for its performances, directing, score, and themes and was frequently hailed alongside '' Spider-Man: No Way Home'' and ''

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 Guardian usually refers to: * Legal guardian, a person with the authority and duty to care for the interests of another * ''The Guardian'', a British daily newspaper (The) Guardian(s) may also refer to: Places * Guardian, West Virginia, Unite ...

'' as one of the best MCU films since '' Avengers: Endgame''. In 2025, a week after the release of ''Thunderbolts*'', Schreier became the top choice to direct an

X-Men The X-Men are a superhero team in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. Created by writer/editor Stan Lee and artist/co-plotter Jack Kirby, the team first appeared in Uncanny X-Men, ''The X-Men'' #1 (September 1963). Although initial ...

film for Marvel Studios.

Filmography

Film

Director * ''

'' (2012) * ''

'' (2015) * ''

'' (2025) Associate producer * ''

Natural Selection Natural selection is the differential survival and reproduction of individuals due to differences in phenotype. It is a key mechanism of evolution, the change in the Heredity, heritable traits characteristic of a population over generation ...

'' (2011) * ''

Magic Valley The Magic Valley, also known as South Central Idaho, is a region in south-central Idaho constituting Blaine, Camas, Cassia, Gooding, Jerome, Lincoln, Minidoka, and Twin Falls counties. It is particularly associated with the agricultural reg ...

'' (2011) * ''First Winter'' (2012) Concert film * '' Chance the Rapper's Magnificent Coloring World'' (2021)

Television

Music videos

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Schreier, Jake Alfred P. Sloan Prize winners Film directors from California Living people Primetime Emmy Award winners Tisch School of the Arts alumni 1981 births