Early career Woolley's first
film as a
producer was
The Company of Wolves (1984), but his career began after leaving
Dame Alice Owen's School in Islington, London. In 1976 he became an usher at the venue
Quentin Tarantino described as “the coolest cinema in London”,
The Screen on the Green in
Islington, run by
Romaine Hart (
OBE), at a time when its ushers wore hotpants. As part of his programming, Woolley developed Friday evenings for special events which in March and May 1980 included early live gigs by the pop group
Spandau Ballet, school pals from Dame Alice's, the second being filmed for
London Weekend Television's youth series
20th-Century Box.
Palace Video and Palace Pictures In 1981 under Woolley's management the Scala relocated to near
King's Cross railway station. Palace Video titles included
David Lynch's
Eraserhead (1977),
Derek Jarman's
The Tempest (1979), and
Werner Herzog's
Fitzcarraldo (1982). It later grew into a theatrical distribution company, retitled Palace Pictures, where Woolley was behind the UK releases of French cult film
Diva (1981),
Sam Raimi's
The Evil Dead (1981),
Nagisa Ōshima's
Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence (1983),
Wim Wenders’
Paris, Texas (1984),
the Coen brothers'
Blood Simple (1984),
Rob Reiner's
When Harry Met Sally (1988) – as well as films by
John Cassavetes,
John Waters,
Mike Leigh,
Ken Loach,
Peter Greenaway,
Fassbinder, and
Bertolucci. Palace Pictures moved into film production in 1984 with its first feature
The Company of Wolves – directed by
Neil Jordan (the first of many films Woolley and Jordan would later make together). Palace Pictures would eventually expand their operations, opening an office in Los Angeles by 1986. Many of Palace Pictures projects were first supported by
Channel 4, and Woolley also helped establish many first-time directors including
Michael Caton-Jones and
Richard Stanley. In 1987, the company decided to set up making American-based films, starting with
Shag, which was funded by
Hemdale Film Corporation with a $4.6 million budget, as well as the first miniseries and its horror picture, which became the "firsts" for the entire Palace Pictures organization. Woolley established an association with
Miramax, which distributed a number of Palace films in the
United States, including
Scandal (1989),
A Rage in Harlem (1991),
Hardware (1990) and
The Crying Game (1992).
Scala Pictures and later career Woolley had established his reputation with a series of low budget but high production value releases, but began developing more ambitious projects. After some box-office disappointments and the recession which weakened Nik Powell's parent company in 1992 Palace Pictures was forced to close. A year later, The Scala Cinema's twelve-year lease expired simultaneously as its defeat in a court case caused by an illegal screening of
A Clockwork Orange, whose screening rights had been withdrawn in the UK by
Stanley Kubrick in 1971, and the financial collapse of Palace precipitated its closure in 1993. Woolley and Powell went on to found Scala Pictures, where they made
Backbeat (1994),
Little Voice (1998)
, Twenty Four Seven (1997), and a series of low budget UK features. Simultaneously, he secured a three-picture deal with
Warner Brothers and made three films with Jordan after the worldwide box office hit of
Interview with the Vampire. ==Personal life==