Rob Marshall

Chicago took the country by storm and single-handedly reinvigorated the genre of the movie musical. The Producers, Rent, Dreamgirls and Hairspray are all coming to screen, but the man that began the revival has abandoned his roots. In only his second feature film project ever, Rob Marshall undertook the difficult challenge of adapting Arthur Golden's acclaimed 1997 novel Memoirs of a Geisha for the screen. The film delves into the elusive geisha culture of pre-WWII Japan. It's a hard sell to a wide audience that's made even harder because of Marshall's insistence upon an all-Asian cast means that the film doesn't boast a big name star like Zeta-Jones or Zellweger. It's risky venture, but this former theater director has proved that great risks can lead to even greater rewards. It only remains to be seen if audiences and Oscar voters will respond to Ziyi Zhang's portrait of the demure but determined Sayuri without all the razzle-dazzle.