Sir Matthew Allard Robert Vaughn (legal name Matthew Allard Robert de Vere Drummond; born 7 March 1971) is an English filmmaker. He has produced films including Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998) and Snatch (2000), and directed Layer Cake (2004), Stardust (2007), Kick-Ass (2010), (2011), and Argylle (2024). Vaughn also co-created the Kingsman comic book series and resulting franchise, directing, producing and co-writing the films (2014), (2017), and The King's Man (2021).
Vaughn made his directorial debut in 2004 with Layer Cake. The film was well received and its success led to Vaughn being tapped to direct (2006), but he dropped out only two weeks before filming began. Subsequently, he said the film was "pretty good" given the limited time they had to make it, but he was critical of Brett Ratner's direction of the film. For his next project he co-wrote and directed Stardust, followed by a movie adaptation of Mark Millar's Kick-Ass in 2010. Vaughn directed and co-wrote the first film in the prequel trilogy of the X-Men film universe titled (2011). Vaughn was signed to return to the series as director of the sequel, (2014), but dropped out in favour of Bryan Singer who had directed the first two films in the original trilogy, X-Men and X2. Vaughn remained attached to the film by co-writing the script.
Vaughn's next directorial project, was (2014), an adaptation of the comic book The Secret Service created by Millar and Dave Gibbons from a concept by Millar and an initially uncredited Vaughn himself (Vaughn being credited as the comic's co-creator on all republications since 2014). The film was scripted by Vaughn and Jane Goldman, and produced by Vaughn's production company Marv Films. Vaughn returned to direct, produce, and co-write the Kingsman sequel, , which was released in theaters in September 2017. Vaughn also directed and provided the story for The King's Man, the third instalment in the franchise serving as a prequel to the original film. Delayed from November 2019 due to both the schedule shuffle following Disney's acquisition of 21st Century Fox and the subsequent COVID-19 pandemic, the film was released on 22 December 2021.
In March 2017, Collider reported that Vaughn was top choice to direct Man of Steel 2; in September of that year, Vaughn confirmed that he was in negotiations with the studio to helm the project. By March 2019, Vaughn stated that discussions with Warner Bros. had ended, and he was no longer involved with development of the film.
Vaughn began working on spy film Argylle in 2021, an original story written by Jason Fuchs and starring an ensemble cast including Henry Cavill, Sam Rockwell, Bryce Dallas Howard, Samuel L. Jackson, Bryan Cranston and John Cena. The film premiered in January 2024, and was released by Universal Pictures and Apple Original Films.
In January 2024, Vaughn announced that he would be producing a third Kick-Ass film, titled Stuntnuts Does School Fight, directed by his longtime stunt coordinator Damien Walters in his feature film debut, which had secretly already been greenlit and had completed filming. also announcing two further films in the Kick-Ass franchise to be in development, to be produced by him as a trilogy, under the working titles Vram and Kick-Ass.
In April 2025, Vaughn announced his involvement in a new film production studio, "UR•MARV", in collaboration with Portuguese footballer Cristiano Ronaldo.
Vaughn has identified himself politically as a conservative and a supporter of the Conservative Party. According to a 2015 article by The Guardian, Vaughn has served on the committee of a Tory fundraising ball, and had been one of the 103 signatories of a letter sent to The Daily Telegraph, that backed David Cameron and George Osborne’s lowering of the corporation tax and criticised Ed Miliband's attempt to introduce a law banning zero-hour contracts.
Vaughn was appointed a Knight Bachelor in the 2024 Prime Minister's Resignation Honours for services to the creative industries.
2004 | Layer Cake | |||
2007 | Stardust | |||
2010 | Kick-Ass | |||
The Debt | ||||
2011 | ||||
2014 | ||||
2017 | ||||
2021 | The King's Man | |||
2024 | Argylle |
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