Stage and film director, born in Constantinople (now Istanbul), NW Turkey. His family emigrated to New York City when he was four, and he studied at Williams College and Yale University. He began as an actor on Broadway and in Hollywood, and with Lee Strasberg he founded the Actors Studio in New York in 1947. He directed his first stage play in 1935, and began directing feature films with A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945), and was to divide his time between New York and Hollywood until 1964. His Broadway productions include the works of Thornton Wilder, Arthur Miller, and Tennessee Williams. His films often had a social or political theme, such as anti-Semitism, racism, megalomania, and corruption, and he was known for getting actors to perform at levels they could not match before or after. He won two Academy Awards as best director for Gentleman's Agreement (1947) and On the Waterfront (1954), but his own favourite film was Viva Zapata (1952), which he considered his first true film. Other notable films include A Streetcar Named Desire (1951), East of Eden (1955), and America, America (1964). His last film was The Last Tycoon (1976). In later years he turned to writing fiction. He published his autobiography, My Life, in 1988, and Beyond the Aegean appeared in 1994. A lifetime achievement award at the 1999 Oscars ceremony was given a mixed response, with opponents recalling that Kazan had given the names of communists in the film industry to the Un-American Activities Committee in the 1950s.
Elia Kazan|
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| Born: |
7 September 1909 İstanbul, Turkey |
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| Died: |
28 September 2003 New York, United States |
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Film and theatre director and producer. Kazan's theater credits included directing A Streetcar Named Desire (1947) and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955), two of the plays that made
Tennessee Williams a theatrical and literary force, and All My Sons (1947) and Death of a Salesman, (1949) the plays which did much the same for Arthur Miller. He received
three Tony Awards, winning for All My Sons, Death of a Salesman, and J.B. Kazan's history as a film director is scarcely less noteworthy. Kazan's later career was marked by his testimony before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) during the postwar "Red Scare", in which he "named names." Kazan had briefly been a member of the Communist Party in his youth, when working as part of a theater troupe, the Group Theater, in the 1930s. At first, although Kazan agreed to testify before HUAC, and readily admitted his former membership in the Communist Party, he refused to name others who had been members. But Kazan felt increasing pressure from Hollywood studio management to cooperate with the Committee and provided the names of former Party members or those connected with Party activities, in order to preserve his career. After a delay, during which he asked for and received permission to release the names of former members of the Party, he was recalled to testify, and at the second examination Kazan provided testimony to the Committee. One of those named as being a Party member was the wife of noted actor John Garfield, with whom Kazan had worked in the Group Theatre troupe, and who was being investigated by HUAC. As Kazan later explained, he felt that it was in the best interest of the country and his own liberal beliefs to cooperate with HUAC's anti-communist efforts in order to counter Communists in Hollywood who were co-opting the liberal agenda. Ironically, though Kazan testified to HUAC under threat of ostracism and blacklisting by the Hollywood studios, he was in turn shunned and ostracized by many of his former friends and particularly the left wing in Hollywood, and this 'reverse blacklist', along with disputes with studio management, may have contributed to a premature end to his Hollywood career. In 1967, Kazan published The Arrangement, a novel about an emotionally-battered middle-aged Greek-American living a double life in California as both an advertising executive, under the name "Eddie Andreson", and a serious, muckraking magazine writer under the name "Evans Arness", neither of which was his birth name, Evangelos Arness. Critics saw parallels to Kazan's own life, most notably that the character had briefly been a member of the Communist Party prior to World War II and of course, the character's Anatolian Greek background and Americanization of his birth name. While many in Hollywood who had experienced the Red Scare felt that enough time had passed that it was appropriate to bury the hatchet and recognize Kazan's great artistic accomplishments, others did not. Some footage from the 1999 Oscars suggests that fully three-quarters of those present in the audience gave him a standing ovation, including Lynn Redgrave, Karl Malden, Meryl Streep and the very liberal Warren Beatty (Beatty later said that he was applauding because Kazan had directed him in his first film Splendor in the Grass, but was not endorsing the decision he made). Elia Kazan died of natural causes at his home in New York. Related LinksJohn Garfield HUAC Lillian Hellman Arthur Miller Abraham PolonskyFurther readingKazan, Elia, Elia Kazan: A Life, New York:Knopf, 1988. ISBN 0-394-55953-3 Maslin, Janet, Assessing Kazan: His Life and Choice (2005) Schickel, Richard, Elia Kazan: A Biography, New York: HarperCollins Pulishers, 2005. ISBN 1-55704-338-8FilmographyThe People of the Cumberland (1937) (short subject) A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945) Watchtower Over Tomorrow (1945) (short subject) (uncredited) The Sea of Grass (1947) Boomerang! (1947) Gentleman's Agreement (1947) Pinky (1949) Panic in the Streets (1950) A Streetcar Named Desire (1951) Viva Zapata! (1952) Man on a Tightrope (1953) On the Waterfront (1954) East of Eden (1955) Baby Doll (1956) A Face in the Crowd (1957) Wild River (1960) Splendor in the Grass (1961) America, America (1963) The Arrangement (1969) The Visitors (1972) The Last Tycoon (1976)
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