Youngest winner for best director Oscar

Before February 26, 2017, the then youngest Best Director Oscar winner was Norman Taurog for the movie Skippy when he won it in 1931 at 32 years, 260 days. Almost 86 years later, Damien Chazelle won the 2017 award for the musical film La La Land, becoming the youngest winner at 32 years and 38 days.

However, getting the chance to film the movie was challenging for him; he wrote the script in 2010 and kept getting turned down due to being unknown and the box office risk of an original musical. Even when he found potential producers, they wanted changes to the script, which Damien turned down. Five years later, after his movie, Whiplash had success, he finally got the go-ahead to make La La Land. The film eventually grossed over $448 million against a budget of $30 million and won six Oscars.