David Ayer

David Ayer (born January 18, 1968) is an American film director, producer, and screenwriter. He is best known for being the writer of Training Day (2001), and the director and writer of Harsh Times (2005), Street Kings (2008), End of Watch (2012), Sabotage (2014), Fury (2014), and Suicide Squad (2016).

Ayer was born in Champaign, Illinois, on January 18, 1968, and grew up in Bloomington, Minnesota, and Bethesda, Maryland, where he was kicked out of his house by his parents as a teenager. Ayer then lived with his cousin in Los Angeles, California, where his experiences in South Central Los Angeles became the inspiration for many of his films. Ayer then enlisted in the United States Navy as a submariner. According to Shia LaBeouf, who starred in Ayer's film Fury, Ayer is "a full subscriber to Christianity."

Ayer at the San Diego Comic-Con International, promoting Suicide Squad.

Ayer's screenplay, U-571 was based on his experiences as a Submariner in the US Navy. Ayer collaborated on the screenplay for The Fast and the Furious in 2001. Ayer wrote the screenplay for crime drama Dark Blue, and it was his research into the Los Angeles Police Department that led to his most prominent screenplay, Training Day. Ayer signed a contract to write a screenplay for S.W.A.T., which was based on his original story pitch. The film was directed by Clark Johnson and released in 2003.

Ayer's directorial debut was with the film Harsh Times, a drama set on the streets of South Central Los Angeles, showing how drug use and past military experiences affects people's attempts to lead normal lives. He then went on to direct the crime thriller Street Kings, which was released in 2008.

Ayer later wrote and directed End of Watch, a drama about the daily lives of two South Central Los Angeles policemen, played by Jake Gyllenhaal and Michael Peña. The film was released in the fall of 2012 to profitable box-office returns and favorable reception from critics, with Roger Ebert naming it as the fourth-best film of 2012, hailing it as "one of the best police movies in recent years". His next film was the crime thriller Sabotage, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger; the film was released on March 28, 2014. He wrote and directed the World War II-set film, Fury, starring Brad Pitt, Shia LaBeouf and Logan Lerman; the film was released in October 2014.

Ayer wrote and directed the film adaptation of the comic book Suicide Squad, which was released on August 5, 2016. The film, along with Ayer's directing, received negative reviews. Critics were negative to mixed in their opinions, though it became his most commercially successful film to date.

Ayer is next set to direct "a contemporary cop thriller, but with fantastical elements" titled Bright, which is set to star Will Smith and Joel Edgerton with a script penned by Max Landis that Ayer himself rewrote. Netflix officially picked up the film for a $90 million deal. Landis stated in an interview that official production is expected to begin in September 2016, but that they've already shot a small part in Los Angeles.

On December 13, 2016, Ayer was brought on board to direct the spin-off of Suicide Squad, titled Gotham City Sirens, starring Margot Robbie reprising her role of Harley Quinn.