| Michael Gordon | |
|---|---|
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| Born | September 6, 1909 Baltimore, Maryland |
| Died | April 29, 1993 Century City, California |
Michael Gordon (September 6, 1909 – April 29, 1993) was an American stage actor and stage and film director.
Born in Baltimore, he was a member of the Group Theatre (1935–1940), and was blacklisted as a Communist in the days of McCarthyism. He later joined the faculty of the UCLA Theatre Arts Department. Gordon was the maternal grandfather of actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt.[1]
Because of his being blacklisted, Gordon's Hollywood career falls into two phases. In 1940, he started as a dialogue director and went on to direct B-movies. In the late 1940s, he distinguished himself by directing not just some action movies but also melodramas and films noir. He also directed the 1950 film Cyrano de Bergerac, for which José Ferrer won a Best Actor Academy Award. After his blacklisting, he was forced to stop directing films temporarily, but was called back to Hollywood at the end of the 1950s by producer Ross Hunter, who wanted him to direct Pillow Talk, a vehicle for Doris Day and Rock Hudson. Subsequently, Gordon's second creative phase was concerned with light-hearted comedy films.
Select filmography as director
- Crime Doctor (1943)
- The Web (1947)
- Another Part of the Forest (1948)
- An Act of Murder (1948)
- The Lady Gambles (1949)
- Cyrano de Bergerac (1950)
- I Can Get It for You Wholesale (1951)
- The Secret of Convict Lake (1951)
- Pillow Talk (1959)
- Portrait in Black (1960)
- Boys' Night Out (1962)
- Move Over, Darling (1963)
- For Love or Money (1963)
- Texas Across the River (1966)
References
- ^ Lidz, Frank (2007-03-25). "From Alien Boy to Growing Star in the Indie Universe". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/25/movies/25lidz.html?_r=1&ref=movies&oref=slogin. Retrieved 2007-03-26.
External links
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