Entertainment

Rooney Mara's Boyfriend Is A Director On The Rise

The Academy Awards is not only a chance for the brightest stars of Hollywood to dress up and get fancy, but their significant others often get to step out as well. Who is Rooney Mara's boyfriend Charlie McDowell? Since he may be the Carol star's date to the Academy Awards on Sunday, here's what we know.

McDowell is an up and coming director. He's also got a pretty impressive showbusiness family. His parents are Mary Steenburgen and Malcolm McDowell. His stepdad is Ted Danson. He also wrote and published a book called Dear Girls Above Me inspired by a Twitter feed he kept to record what he overheard his neighbors talking about. According to E!Online, he has been with Mara since at least 2012 and also dated Kristin Chenoweth and Haylie Duff. As an up and coming director, he worked with Ken Burns and Larry David before making his own films.

This is the type of Hollywood relationship that makes sense to me. He and Mara have similar interests, but different roles. I can see how they would fit together. His next project actually stars the Oscar nominee— a film called The Discovery that also stars Nicholas Hoult, your favorite from Skins, Mad Max: Fury Road, and the latest X-Men movies. It's a science fiction romantic comedy set in a world in which the afterlife has been scientifically proven. Here are a few of his other directorial credits

Silicon Valley

According to McDowell's Twitter account, he directed some episodes of the upcoming season of the HBO series.

Bye Bye Benjamin

Here's a clip from a short he directed in 2006.

The One I Love

His feature film starred Elizabeth Moss and Mark Duplass. You can watch that movie on Netflix right now! So, if you see McDowell on the red carpet with Mara on Sunday, know that this is not unfamiliar territory for him at all, and hey! He might be a nominee himself one day. At the very least, they're super cute together. If this is what they look like on Halloween, expect the Oscars to step it up a notch.