Danny Boyle Takes DGA Award

DGA Winner Danny Boyle on the set of "Slumdog Millionaire." Image courtesy of Fox Searchlight.

"Slumdog Millionaire" continued its Oscar precursor streak tonight as Danny Boyle took home his first Directors Guild of America Award at a ceremony held at the Hyatt Regency Century Plaza in Los Angeles. Rather expectedly, Boyle beat out "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button"'s David Fincher, "Milk"'s Gus Van Sant, "The Dark Knight"'s Christopher Nolan, and "Frost/Nixon"'s Ron Howard in the Feature Film category.

This gives "Slumdog" another award to add to its Producers Guild of America Award, Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Ensemble Cast, and both Golden Globe and Critic's Choice Award for Best Picture.

In the Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Documentaries category, "Waltz With Bashir"'s Ari Folman beat out "Man on Wire"'s James Marsh, "At The Death House Door"'s Peter Gilbert and Steve James, "The Judge and the General"'s Elizabeth Farnsworth and Patricio Lanfranco Leverton, and "Stranded: I've Come fro a Plane That Crashed on the Mountain"'s Gonzalo Arijon.

Only six times since the DGA Awards began in 1948 has the Feature Film winner not gone on to win the corresponding Academy Award. Twice this decade, in 2000 and 2002, this occurred, when "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon"'s Ang Lee and "Chicago"'s Rob Marshall won the DGA while "Traffic"'s Steven Soderbergh and "The Pianist"'s Roman Polanski won the Oscars. Last year, Joel & Ethan Coen won both the DGA and the Oscar for "No Country For Old Men."