Name:
Date of Birth:
Michael Curtiz
24 December 1886
Michael Curtiz created 23 movies in the Horror, Thriller, Music, Mystery, Action, Adventure, Romance, Crime, Drama, Film-Noir, Western, Biography, History, War, Musical, Comedy, Music genres.
Michael Curtiz got succeed with average imdb rating 7.1.
Interred at Forest Lawn, Glendale, CA., in the Whispering Pines section.
Brother of assistant director David Curtiz.
Biography in: John Wakeman, editor. "World Film Directors, Volume One, 1890-1945". Pages 172-181. New York: The H.W. Wilson Company, 1987.
Could be intensely absorbed, to the point of distraction. Once was hurt falling out of a moving car because he wanted to write down an idea. He was driving at the time.
His stepson, John Meredyth Lucas said he spoke 5 languages, all of them badly. His thick Hungarian accent often made it difficult for cast and crew members to understand his English. During the filming of Casablanca (1942), for instance, he asked a set dresser for a "poodle" and later it was discovered that, in fact, he wanted a "poodle" of water! On the set of The Cabin in the Cotton (1932), Curtiz made a speech on how he wanted the actors to act like "woodpeckers" when the script described them as "peckerwoods".
... Directed 10 different actors in Oscar-nominated performances: Paul Muni, John Garfield, James Cagney, Walter Huston, Humphrey Bogart, Claude Rains, Joan Crawford, Ann Blyth, Eve Arden and William Powell. Cagney and Crawford won Oscars for their performances in one of Curtiz' movies.
Jodie Foster used to own a home that Curtiz built in 1934. The house was originally a guest house on the large estate that he owned. It is copied from small quaint Cotswold cottages found in the midlands in England. In 1995 she put the home up for sale for $1.1 million.
Fought in the Hungarian army during World War I.
He had one son, John Meredyth Lucas, whom he adopted in 1929 when the boy was ten years old.
His two most fruitful collaborations with stars were with Errol Flynn (they did 12 films together) and Humphrey Bogart (they did 8 films together).
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