Steven Soderbergh’s Beautifully Bizarre and Busy Retirement

Director and producer Steven Soderbergh is one prolific filmmaker responsible for over 25 feature-length films, making Jennifer Lopez a credible actress (see: Out of Sight), and re-inventing the Rat Pack with George Clooney and Brad Pitt in the Ocean’s Eleven series. While he was seemingly in his prime, Soderbergh suddenly announced his retirement in 2011, promising that his films, Liberace and Man From U.N.C.L.E., would be his last.

Since then several things happened. Liberace, starring Matt Damon and Michael Douglas, was retitled Behind the Candelabra and released on HBO in May 2013 while U.N.C.L.E. didn’t pan out. The film went to Guy Ritchie and Soderbergh packed his retirement plans with several projects and later clarified his statement about quitting Hollywood. In 2013, the filmmaker said he “won’t be directing ’cinema.'”

No matter the definition of his retirement, Soderbergh, like many entertainers who promised to quit the business before him, has kept himself extremely busy. Since cutting himself off from directing he’s turned his attention to cinematography, as well as editing and producing films, TV shows, and plays, re-cutting films, tweeting a novella, and endorsing booze. His latest project is Cinemax’s beautifully hypnotic medical drama, The Knick, starring Clive Owen. Sadly the first season is coming to an end this week, but we’re sure Soderbergh will return to the director’s chair for season 2.

Check out everything Soderbergh has done in the past year since his “retirement”:

• Glue

  [Photo: Justin Hook]

• Psychos

  [Photo: Paramount Pictures]

• Singani 63

  [Photo: Singani 63]

• Heaven’s Gate: The Butcher’s Cut

  [Photo: United Artists]

• The Library

  [Photo: Public Theater]

• The Knick

  [Photo: Cinemax]

• Magic Mike XXL

  [Photo: @bitchuation]

[Photos: Getty]