Director Born in Constantinople (Istanbul), Turkey
A truly pioneering Hollywood director, Elia Kazan in the late 1940s and early
1950s helped blaze trails into the largely uncharted territories of social
consciousness and cinematic naturalism, turning out some of the era's most
memorable movies and influencing subsequent generations of filmmakers. Born to
Greek parents who came to America when he was a small child, Kazan fell under
the spell of the theater as a young man, acting in New York's avant-garde Group
Theatre troupe and eventually becoming a director whose Broadway triumphs
included the original productions of "The Skin of Our Teeth," "All My Sons," "A
Streetcar Named Desire," and "Death of a Salesman."
Kazan, whose first brush with the movie industry consisted of assisting
documentarian Ralph Steiner in the mid 1930s and acting in two Warner Bros.
films, City for Conquest (1940) and Blues in the Night (1941), was courted by
20th CenturyFox's Darryl F. Zanuck, who signed him to a contract in 1944. From
the first, directing A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945), Kazan evinced an ability
to coax great performances from his actors; star James Dunn and child actress
Peggy Ann Garner both won Oscars for their turns in this lovely, evocative
film.Boomerang! (1947), part-murder mystery, partcourtroom drama, also featured
superb performances and presented a subtle but definite comment on political
corruption.Gentleman's Agreement (also 1947), starring Gregory Peck, was a
full-blown treatise on anti-Semitism that won Oscars for Kazan, supporting
actress Celeste Holm, and as Best Picture. Seen today, the picture seems rather
tame and obvious, but it was considered a real breakthrough back in 1947. Kazan
took on race relations in Pinky (1949), the story of a light-skinned black woman
(improbably played by Jeanne Crain) who passes for white; it too was thought
very daring at the time but has lost much of its impact in the intervening
years. In retrospect, Kazan considered his first "real" film to be Panic in the
Streets (1950), a solid thriller about efforts to contain a burgeoning epidemic
which was shot entirely on the streets of New Orleans.
Kazan picked up yet another nomination for East of Eden (1955), in which he
did for newcomer James Dean what he'd done for Brando a few years earlier.
Viewers today are still riveted by the rawness of emotions the director managed
to capture in this powerful Steinbeck story of a family in conflict. By this
time, he had fully mastered the cinematic technique (critics of his earlier
pictures suggested that they were too much like filmed stage plays), and was
producing his own pictures. The wildly provocative Baby Doll (1956), A Face in
the Crowd (1957), Wild River (1960), and Splendor in the Grass (1961) all bore
Kazan's stamp of quality, but didn't quite match his earlier successes.America,
America (1963), based on the experiences of Kazan's own uncle, movingly captured
the turn-of-the-century immigrant experience and snagged Oscar nominations for
Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Screenplay (which Kazan himself had
written). It also ended his most fertile creative period.
Since then, Kazan has directed only three films-The Arrangement (1969, based
on his own novel), the little-seen The Visitors (1972), and The Last Tycoon
(1976, a highly anticipated but ultimately disappointing F. Scott Fitzgerald
adaptation)and has abandoned the theater altogether. Kazan was married to
actresses Molly Day Thatcher and Barbara Loden. His autobiography, "A Life," was
published in 1988. His son, Nicholas Kazan, is a screenwriter who was
Oscar-nominated for Reversal of Fortune (1990) and made his directing debut with
Dream Lover (1994).
A truly pioneering Hollywood director, Elia Kazan in the late 1940s and early
1950s helped blaze trails into the largely uncharted territories of social
consciousness and cinematic naturalism, turning out some of the era's most
memorable movies and influencing subsequent generations of filmmakers. Born to
Greek parents who came to America when he was a small child, Kazan fell under
the spell of the theater as a young man, acting in New York's avant-garde Group
Theatre troupe and eventually becoming a director whose Broadway triumphs
included the original productions of "The Skin of Our Teeth," "All My Sons," "A
Streetcar Named Desire," and "Death of a Salesman."
