Things I Hate About You is a 1999 American romantic comedy film starring Julia Stiles, Heath Ledger, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Andrew Keegan, David Krumholtz, Larisa Oleynik, and Larry Miller, and is directed by Gil Junger. An adaptation of Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew set in a modern American high school, the screenplay was written by Karen McCullah Lutz and Kirsten Smith. The movie's title is a twist on The Taming of the Shrew (see below) but is also a reference to a poem written by the film's female lead to describe her bittersweet romance with the male lead.