GEORGE STEVENS Biography - Theater, Opera and Movie personalities

 
 

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GEORGE STEVENS

Name: George Stevens                                                               
Born: 18 December 1904 Oakland, California                                         
Died: 8 March 1975 Lancaster, California                                           
                                                                                   
George Stevens (December 18, 1904 - March 8, 1975) was an Academy Award-winning     
American motion picture director, producer, writer and cinematographer.             
                                                                                   
Born in Oakland, California, Stevens broke into the movie business as a             
cameraman, working on many Laurel and Hardy shorts. His first feature film was     
The Cohens and Kellys in Trouble in 1933.                                           
                                                                                   
In 1934 he got his first directing job, the slapstick Kentucky Kernels. His big     
break came when he directed Katharine Hepburn in Alice Adams in 1935. He went on   
in the late 1930s to direct several Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire movies, not     
only with the two actors together, but on their own. In 1940, he directed Carole   
Lombard in Vigil in the Night, and the film has an alternate ending for European   
audiences in recognition of World War II, which the US had not yet entered.         
                                                                                   
During the Second World War, Stevens' crew captured the only Allied European       
Front color film of the war, in addition to filming the graphic scenes at the       
Dachau concentration camp. As a result of his experiences, his films became more   
dramatic following the war. I Remember Mama in 1948 was the last movie with         
comic scenes that he made. He was responsible for such classic films as A Place     
in the Sun, Shane, The Diary of Anne Frank, Giant and The Greatest Story Ever       
Told. Stevens has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1701 Vine Street.         
                                                                                   
Stevens died after a heart attack on his ranch in Lancaster, California.