The 2025 Creative 100: Directors Who Stole the Show

These creative minds shaped the cultural moments of the past year, from Conclave to Charli XCX’s Brat tour, Wicked to Libresse’s wild and relatable ad about women’s health. Edward Berger, Sweetshop Selection Sunday: The German director and screenwriter’s U.S. debut with 2024’s Conclave fictionalized the closed-door selection of the pope’s successor and immediately became an online sensation. The film also won real accolades, among them three 2025 BAFTAs (including Best Film and Best Director), and earned Edward Berger Critics’ Choice and Golden Globe nods. Immersive viewing: Berger directed Apple’s first scripted project for its Vision Pro virtual reality headset, a 17-minute film that took viewers inside a World War II-era submarine under attack by enemy warships. Action shot: He is rumored to be on the short list of directors for the next Jason Bourne and James Bond franchises. Calmatic, Prettybird Hit the road: Calmatic’s career as a music video director took off with “Old Town Road” by Lil Nas X, which won the Grammy for Best Music Video in 2020. This past year, he’s worked with Kendrick Lamar, set an Amazon Prime ad featuring a little girls’ tea party to Wu Tang Clan, and took WNBA phenom Angel Reese to a nail salon for Cash App. Drop the remix: Calmatic has also gotten into films with remakes of two L.A. classics, House Party and White Men Can’t Jump, in 2023. Jon M. Chu, Wicked Riding high: Jon M. Chu first won acclaim for directing 2018’s Crazy Rich Asians. Last year, he soared to new heights with Wicked, which became the top-grossing film adaptation of a Broadway musical. Fasten your seatbelt: Chu once directed an in-flight safety video for Virgin America. He’s so lucky: His memoir, Viewfinder, came out over the summer. His next project, appropriately, is directing the film adaptation of Britney Spears’ 2023 memoir, The Woman in Me. Calling it early: Chu was a film student at the University of Southern California when he first saw the theater production of Wicked. “I remember thinking, this is the most cinematic show I’ve ever seen,” he told the New York Times. “Someone’s going to make a great movie out of this.” Brady Corbet, Magna Studios Highlight reel: It was a monumental year for the 36-year-old filmmaker, who took home Best Motion Picture at the Golden Globes for the ambitious period drama The Brutalist. He also made his advertising directorial debut with a cinematic trio of ads for Bloomberg Media. In front of the camera: Corbet is also an actor, whose first gig was an episode of the CBS sitcom The King of Queens. Closest collaborators: Coming later this year is a musical that Corbet produced for his partner, Norwegian filmmaker and actress Mona Fastvold. And the couple’s 10-year-old daughter, Ava James, is already a regular on sets. “She’s there with us at the monitor 90% of the time,” he told NBC. Coralie Fargeat, Reset Quite substantial: Coralie Fargeat’s second feature film, The Substance, had a budget of $18 million and made more than $75 million at the box office. It earned a slew of accolades this award season, marked a major comeback for Demi Moore, and put its distributor, Mubi, on the map. Her process: Fargeat wrote the script for The Substance on spec, just one of the many creative risks she took to keep the film true to her vision. She directed, produced (with Working Title), and co-edited the final product. Best advice: “My whole life, I felt I wasn’t fitting in the real world. For a long time I saw this as a flaw, until I finally decided to embrace it and dive 100% in my own creative world, rather than try and change myself to fit in the existing world.” Lucy Forbes, Smuggler Mad props: When menstrual products company Libresse hired Forbes to bring its “Never Just a Period” ad campaign to life, she delivered a fuzzy dancing uterus, a growling box of tampons, an IUD that resembled a medieval weapon, and more eclectic period paraphernalia. “This project hit so many chords for me, so many memories of not knowing what the hell was going on with my body, the confusion, worry, shame,” she explains. Wonderful time: Forbes directed a Christmas caper for the British grocery chain Waitrose that featured Succession’s Matthew Macfadyen as a small-town sleuth. While the premise of investigating a stolen holiday treat is playful and absurd, at heart it’s a “love letter” to that special time of year. It’s a vibe: The British filmmaker set her 2024 Netflix series, the Benedict Cumberbatch-starring Eric, in 1980s New York, relying on street photography and documentaries of the time. “Building that world from the ground up was a complete dream come true,” she recalled. Luca Guadagnino, Little Minx Hit after hit: The Call Me By Your Name filmmaker had two big hits in 2024: the Zendaya-led tennis romance Challengers and Daniel Craig’s period drama Queer. Star power: Guadagnino works with major stars in ads, too, most recently Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi for Chanel No. 5. Next up: The Italian filmmaker’s After the Hunt, about a college abuse scandal, drops in October. The movie—starring Julia Roberts, Ayo Edebiri, and Andrew Garfield—already has awards buzz. King She, Somesuch Hot from go: The husband and wife directing duo of Radha Ganti and Robert Lopuski only started making work in 2022, yet have already racked up awards including gold and silver Cannes Lions. Recent wins: The Brooklyn-based duo has directed Olivia Rodrigo for Lancôme, a dreamy time-traveling short film for British department store John Lewis, and a defiant Powerade ad with Olympic gold medalist Sha’Carri Richardson. How clients stand out: “When a script comes to us with any kind of opportunity to develop the sonic space in an interesting way, that always catches our attention,” they told Little Black Book. C Prinz, Smuggler London calling: Last year, C Prinz directed God Is Good, a short film written by and starring actor/singer Jeremy Pope that used narrative, dance, and music to further the conversation about queer kids in conservative families. “It was the culmination of everything I have mastered up to today,” they say. Brat pack: Prinz was the choreographer and camera director for Charli XCX's Brat and Sweat tours. “We built the Brat Tour before the album dropped in a warehouse with five people in the middle of nowhere,” they recalled. “It was a life-changing experience to feel such a fast reaction between creative release and global impact.” Side gig: Prinz is Grammy winner Doechii’s creative director and shot the rapper’s “Crazy” video. Marie Schuller, RSA All the feels: For online bank Monzo’s “Money Never Felt Like Monzo,” Marie Schuller directed a minute-long sensory journey that brought emotion to the typically technical conversation around money management. The Monzo campaign was also a departure for the London- and Barcelona-based professional, who usually works in fashion and beauty. If you can: Try to work in Italy. "Shooting Valentino in Liguria was bloody excellent," she recalls. "Two-hour lunches even though we are behind schedule, beautiful people and beautiful weather, five pastas in 24 hours. It was a good time." Learn to edit: When you only have six seconds to tell a brand story, make it good. “I’m literally the director with a stopwatch out complaining that a whip pan took four frames too long.” Best advice: "Don’t reference too much. If you try to look like Yorgos Lanthimos or Jonathan Glazer, you will never be better than them. If you do your own thing, people can’t compare you to anyone.”

The Creative 100

The 2025 Creative 100: Directors Who Stole the Show

From Conclave to Powerade, ADWEEK's 2025 winners used bold storytelling to captivate viewers.

Edward Berger, Sweetshop

Meredith Begley

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