Do we like Baz Luhrmann?
Our score: 7 out of 10. Clean on harm and no misconduct on record, but little documented good beyond his work and an honour, so we stop short of the top end.
Baz Luhrmann is the Australian director behind the big, sparkly, over-the-top spectacles that fans either adore or find a bit much. He was made a Companion of the Order of Australia, the nation's top rank, in the King's Birthday honours in June 2025, for his work in film and theatre. That's the career in a sentence: a bloke who made maximalism into a brand.
On scandals, there's honestly not much to tell. Searches for lawsuits, court rulings and allegations against him came back empty, apart from a name mix-up with an unrelated person with a similar surname. The only gossip we found was idle chatter about his private life, which is tabloid territory and not our business.
On the harm check, nothing of his own turned up: no campaigning against LGBTQ+ or trans people, no anti-vax or climate-denial noise, no slide into grievance. In a February 2026 podcast interview he said artists have to express themselves, and that a government shooting citizens who protest, in Iran or America, is “absolutely, totally, morally wrong.” Our searches turned up no sign of him keeping harmful company, though we didn't find a full list of his recent collaborators.
The recent stuff is Elvis, again. He told Rolling Stone Australia that Elvis was outspoken early on but was steered away from political statements by his manager Colonel Parker. He also let slip on UK radio that a stage musical of Elvis is in the works, which he won't direct himself, saying “I'm not precious.”
The good stuff is mostly the work and the recognition. His honour came with a statement saying it recognised those who made access to the arts possible, which is a nice thing to say. We found no documented charity drives or personal kindness stories in what we read, so that's honestly the gap.
So the verdict: pass on harm, pass on nice, with the caveat that the record is thin on good deeds. His next film, a Joan of Arc epic, was reported by a producer in late 2025 as targeting a mid-2026 shoot with Warner Bros in talks. A producer also described him as a big proponent of AI as a creative tool, which some will side-eye. We'd happily buy a ticket.