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The Duffer Brothers
American television writers, directors, and producers From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Matt Duffer and Ross Duffer (born February 15, 1984), often credited as the Duffer Brothers, are both American television writers, directors, and producers. The brothers are identical twins and work on all their projects as a pair.[1] They are best known as the creators, directors, and executive producers of the Netflix science fiction horror series Stranger Things (2016-2025), and have also written and directed the horror film Hidden (2015) and written and produced episodes of the Fox science fiction series Wayward Pines (2015–2016). The Duffer Brothers founded the production company Upside Down Pictures, which is in an overall deal with Netflix.[2]
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Career
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After the brothers had written and directed several short films, they wrote a script titled "Origin" which gained them an agent, then their script for the post-apocalyptic horror film Hidden was acquired by Warner Bros. Pictures in 2011.[3] The brothers would go on to direct Hidden, which was released in 2015. Next the Duffer brothers were hired as writers/producers for the Fox television series Wayward Pines. As of 2024, they are also the executive producers of a Netflix show called The Boroughs, described as a supernatural drama set in a retirement community in the New Mexico desert.[4]
Stranger Things
With experience in television, they began pitching their idea for television series adaptation of the same name, which Dan Cohen eventually brought to Shawn Levy. Backed by Levy's 21 Laps production company, the show was quickly picked up by Netflix.[5][6] The show is set in 1980s Indiana and is an homage to 1980s pop culture,[7] inspired and aesthetically informed by the works of Steven Spielberg, John Carpenter, Wes Craven, Sam Raimi, David Lynch, Stephen King, and George Lucas, among others.[8][9]
It was released on July 15, 2016, to overwhelming praise,[10] specifically for its characterization, pacing, atmosphere, acting, soundtrack, directing, writing, and homages to 1980s genre films. It began to develop a cult following online.[11] Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes gave the series an approval rating of 92%, based on 82 reviews, with a weighted average score of 7.96/10. The site's critical consensus states, "Exciting, heartbreaking, and sometimes scary, Stranger Things acts as an addictive homage to Spielberg films and vintage 1980s television."[12]
On September 30, 2019, Netflix announced it had signed the Duffers for additional films and television shows over the coming years.[13]
In March 2021, the duo announced they will team up with Spielberg to adapt Stephen King's and Peter Straub's The Talisman as a Netflix series. They will both be executive producers via Amblin Partners and Monkey Massacre and have hired Curtis Gwinn, who worked as a writer-executive producer on Stranger Things, to act as writer and showrunner of the project.[14]
Following the premiere of the fourth season of Stranger Things in July 2022, the Duffers launched the production company Upside Down Pictures, for which they recommitted to Netflix with several new projects. Among these include a live-action series adaptation of Death Note and a series adaptation of The Talisman, in addition to their follow-up series to Stranger Things.[15]
In October 2023, Ross Duffer was one of many working in the film and television industry that signed the open letter to President Joe Biden thanking him for his "unshakeable moral conviction" in supporting Israel with military funding and aid and petitioning the President to secure the release of more Israeli hostages.[16][17]
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Personal lives
The Duffer Brothers were born and raised in Durham, North Carolina, the sons of Ann M. Christensen, a part-time real estate broker,[18] and Allen P. Duffer Jr., a film buff and Research Triangle Institute[19] Project Director.[20] They began making films in the third grade, using a Hi8 video camera that was a gift from their parents.[21][22] They attended the Duke School for Children[22] a private suburban school, from grades K through 8, and then the Charles E. Jordan High School, a large Durham public school. They were accepted at the Florida State University College of Motion Picture Arts, but were not willing to be educated separately.[23] They toured New York University Tisch School of the Arts Department of Cinema Studies and USC School of Cinematic Arts but were not accepted, but someone they met introduced them to someone,[23] who suggested Chapman University's Dodge College of Film and Media Arts for film study and they relocated to Orange, California, where they graduated in 2007.[5][24] Matt has one child; Winona Ryder is the godmother.[25]
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Filmography
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