Known For
Directing
Born
Sep 07, 1909
Died
Sep 28, 2003
Place of Birth
Constantinople, Ottoman Empire [now Istanbul, Turkey]
Credits
60 titles
Elia Kazan
Biography
Elia Kazan ( September 7 , 1909, Kayseri – September 28, 2003) was a Greek-American director and actor, described as "one of the most honored and influential directors in Broadway and Hollywood history". He also produced, and wrote screenplays and novels. Born in the Kayseri, Ottoman Empire to Greek parents, they emigrated to New York when he was four. After two years studying acting at Yale, he acted professionally for eight years before becoming a stage and film director. Kazan co-founded the influential Group Theater in 1932 and Actors Studio in 1947, and together with Lee Strasberg, introduced Method acting to the American stage and cinema as a new form of self-expression and psychological "realism". Having been an actor himself for eight years, he brought sensitivity and understanding of the acting process, and was later considered the ideal "actor's director". He himself acted in only a few films, including City for Conquest (1940), alongside James Cagney. Overall, Kazan influenced the films of the 1950s and 1960s by his run of provocative, issues-driven subjects, and acting. Moreover, his personal brand of cinema, employing real locations over sets, unknowns over stars, and realism over convenient genres, proved influential to a whole generation of independent filmmakers in the 1960s. Film author Ian Freer concludes that "If his achievements are tainted by political controversy, the debt Hollywood — and actors everywhere — owes him, is enormous." In 2010, Martin Scorsese co-directed the documentary film, A Letter to Elia, as a personal tribute to Kazan, who he credits as the inspiration for his becoming a filmmaker.
Known For
Filmography
The Making of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
An American Named Kazan
Self (archive footage)
Arthur Miller: Writer
Self (archive footage)
Marlon Brando: An Actor Named Desire
Self - Filmmaker (archive footage)
Inside Rupert Pupkin
Self (archive footage)
A Letter to Elia
Self (archive footage)
A Streetcar in Hollywood
Self (archive footage)
An Actor Named Brando
Self (archive footage)
A Man Named Brando
Self
A Streetcar on Broadway
Self (archive footage)
East of Eden: Art in Search of Life
Himself
Arthur Miller, Elia Kazan and the Blacklist: None Without Sin
Self (Archive footage)
Backstory: 'Gentleman's Agreement'
Self (archive footage)
Diaspora
Writer
Life at Any Cost
Elia Kazan: A Director's Journey
Self
Tennessee Williams: Orpheus of the American Stage
Self (archive footage)
Sanford Meisner: The American Theatre's Best Kept Secret
Self
Hello Actors Studio
Self
Mist
Old man in the coffee house
Empire City
Self
Elia Kazan: An Outsider
Self
Natalie - A Tribute to a Very Special Lady
I Am Wanda
Self
The Kennedy Center Honors
Self
The Last Tycoon
Director
Apostrophes
Self
Spécial cinéma
Self
The Visitors
Director
The Arrangement
Novel
A New Lifestyle
Self
The Dick Cavett Show
Self - Guest
Die Drehscheibe
Self
America America
Producer
The Merv Griffin Show
Self
The Mike Douglas Show
Self
Splendor in the Grass
Producer
Wild River
Director
A Face in the Crowd
Producer
Baby Doll
Director
Cinépanorama
Self
East of Eden
Producer
On the Waterfront
Director
Man on a Tightrope
Director
The Oscars
Self
Viva Zapata!
Director
A Streetcar Named Desire
Director
The Screen Director
Self (archive footage) (uncredited)
Panic in the Streets
Cleaver - Mortuary Assistant (uncredited)
Pinky
Director