Born on January 18, 1968 in Champaign, Illinois, David Yesterday He spent most of his childhood traveling around the United States with his family, until they settled in south central Los Angeles.
Dissatisfied with his high school education, and unwilling to give college a chance, he dropped out of high school and joined the navy; both environments would be central in his future stories.
After a long stint in the military (during which he worked on a nuclear submarine operating sonar, during the Cold War), Yesterday He took up construction jobs, wrote short stories, and claims he learned to write movie scripts by reading Syd Field.
He finally entered the field of screenwriting at age 30, through a friendship with screenwriter Wesley Strick, who landed him a job. The studios hired Yesterday to rewrite Antoine Fuqua’s script “Training day: Training day”. Released in 2001, starring Ethan Hawke and Denzel Washington, the film eventually became a box office success and a critical success upon its release.
As “Training Day” entered its pre-production phase, he was hired as a third writer for the film “U-571,” a thriller about a World War II submarine. Yesterday drew heavily on his naval experience. Released in April 2000, the film starring Harvey Keitel, Jon Bon Jovi, Bill Paxton and Matthew McConaughey, grossed $ 95 million worldwide.
Meanwhile, work flowed steadily. Yesterday signed an option to write “The Fast and the Furious” (2001) with the writers Gary Scott Thompson and Erik Bergquist for Universal. Like “Training day: Training day”, here the scene explored was the city of Los Angeles with its gangs and criminal life; Y Yesterday once more He made great use of his experiences as a teenager.
Somewhat pigeonholed as a writer of crime and action stories, he tried to repeat his previous successes in two 2003 projects. “Dark Blue” (2003) – his first credited solo effort – was directed by Ron Shelton and starred Kurt Russell as Eldon perry. Critical reactions were mixed and the film did quite well at the box office.
A couple of years later
Yesterday introduced his new writing job that also marked his directorial debut, “Harsh Times,” which, like its predecessors, focused on a Los Angeles cop, played by Christian Bale.
Already in 2008 “Street Kings” was released that Yesterday he directed from a script by James Ellroy and starring Keanu Reeves and Forest Whitaker.
Yesterday returned to write and direct his next films, beginning with “Without truce (End of watch)” (2012) with Jake Gyllenhaal leading the cast; then it was the turn of “Sabotage)” (2014), with Arnold Schwarzenegger and, finally, the war drama “Hearts of Steel)” (2015), whose cast is headed by Brad Pitt.