Lewis Milestone
Encyclopedia
Lewis Milestone (September 30, 1895 – September 25, 1980) was a Russian-American motion picture
director. He is known for directing Two Arabian Knights
(1927) and All Quiet on the Western Front (1930), both of which received Academy Awards for Best Director. He also directed The Front Page
(1931 - nomination), The General Died at Dawn
(1936), Of Mice and Men
(1940), Ocean's Eleven
(1960), and Mutiny on the Bounty
(1962).
, Imperial Russia (now Chişinău
), Moldova
to a family of Jewish heritage. He came to the United States in 1912 just prior to World War I. Milestone held a number of odd jobs before enlisting in the U.S. Signal Corps, where he worked as an assistant director on Army training films during the war. In 1919 he became a naturalized citizen of the United States.
After the war he went to Hollywood, where he first worked as a film cutter, and later as an assistant director. Howard Hughes
promoted Milestone to director, and one of his early efforts, the 1928 film Two Arabian Knights
, won him an Oscar
in the first Academy Award ceremony. He also directed The Racket
, an early gangster film, and later helped Hughes direct scenes for his aviation saga Hell's Angels
(for which he never received credit).
Milestone won his second Academy Award
for All Quiet on the Western Front, a harrowing screen adaptation of the antiwar novel by Erich Maria Remarque
. His next, The Front Page
, brought the Ben Hecht
/Charles MacArthur
play to the screen. It earned him another Oscar nomination. His work during the 1930s and 1940s was always easily identifiable by its lighting and imaginative use of fluid camera. He worked extensively in television from the mid 1950s.
Lewis Milestone's final request before he died in 1980 was for Universal Studios to restore All Quiet on the Western Front to its original length. That request would eventually be granted nearly two decades later by Universal and other film preservation companies, and this restored version is what is widely seen today on television and home video. Milestone is interred in the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery
in Los Angeles.
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
director. He is known for directing Two Arabian Knights
Two Arabian Knights
Two Arabian Knights is an American comedy film, directed by Lewis Milestone and starring William Boyd and Mary Astor. A silent film, Two Arabian Knights was produced by Howard Hughes and was distributed by United Artists.-Plot:...
(1927) and All Quiet on the Western Front (1930), both of which received Academy Awards for Best Director. He also directed The Front Page
The Front Page (1931 film)
The Front Page is a 1931 American comedy film, directed by Lewis Milestone and starring Adolphe Menjou and Pat O'Brien. Based on a Broadway play of the same name, the film was produced by Howard Hughes, written by Bartlett Cormack and Charles Lederer, and distributed by United Artists. The...
(1931 - nomination), The General Died at Dawn
The General Died at Dawn
The General Died at Dawn is a 1936 film that tells the story of a mercenary who meets a beautiful girl while trying to keep arms from getting to a vicious warlord in war-torn China. The movie was written by Charles G. Booth and Clifford Odets, and directed by Lewis Milestone.It stars Gary Cooper,...
(1936), Of Mice and Men
Of Mice and Men
Of Mice and Men is a novella written by Nobel Prize-winning author John Steinbeck. Published in 1937, it tells the tragic story of George Milton and Lennie Small, two displaced migrant ranch workers during the Great Depression in California, USA....
(1940), Ocean's Eleven
Ocean's Eleven (1960 film)
Ocean's 11 is a 1960 heist film directed by Lewis Milestone and starring five Rat Packers: Peter Lawford, Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr., and Joey Bishop....
(1960), and Mutiny on the Bounty
Mutiny on the Bounty (1962 film)
Mutiny on the Bounty is a 1962 film starring Marlon Brando and Trevor Howard based on the novel Mutiny on the Bounty by Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall. The film retells the 1789 real-life mutiny aboard HMAV Bounty led by Fletcher Christian against the ship's captain, William Bligh...
(1962).
Biography
Milestone was born in Kishinev, BessarabiaBessarabia
Bessarabia is a historical term for the geographic region in Eastern Europe bounded by the Dniester River on the east and the Prut River on the west....
, Imperial Russia (now Chişinău
Chisinau
Chișinău is the capital and largest municipality of Moldova. It is also its main industrial and commercial centre and is located in the middle of the country, on the river Bîc...
), Moldova
Moldova
Moldova , officially the Republic of Moldova is a landlocked state in Eastern Europe, located between Romania to the West and Ukraine to the North, East and South. It declared itself an independent state with the same boundaries as the preceding Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic in 1991, as part...
to a family of Jewish heritage. He came to the United States in 1912 just prior to World War I. Milestone held a number of odd jobs before enlisting in the U.S. Signal Corps, where he worked as an assistant director on Army training films during the war. In 1919 he became a naturalized citizen of the United States.
After the war he went to Hollywood, where he first worked as a film cutter, and later as an assistant director. Howard Hughes
Howard Hughes
Howard Robard Hughes, Jr. was an American business magnate, investor, aviator, engineer, film producer, director, and philanthropist. He was one of the wealthiest people in the world...
promoted Milestone to director, and one of his early efforts, the 1928 film Two Arabian Knights
Two Arabian Knights
Two Arabian Knights is an American comedy film, directed by Lewis Milestone and starring William Boyd and Mary Astor. A silent film, Two Arabian Knights was produced by Howard Hughes and was distributed by United Artists.-Plot:...
, won him an Oscar
Academy Awards
An Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...
in the first Academy Award ceremony. He also directed The Racket
The Racket
The Racket is an American crime film directed by Lewis Milestone and starring Thomas Meighan, Marie Prevost, Louis Wolheim, and George E. Stone...
, an early gangster film, and later helped Hughes direct scenes for his aviation saga Hell's Angels
Hell's Angels (film)
Hell's Angels is a 1930 American war film, directed by Howard Hughes and starring Jean Harlow, Ben Lyon, and James Hall. The film, which was produced by Hughes and written by Harry Behn and Howard Estabrook, centers on the combat pilots of World War I...
(for which he never received credit).
Milestone won his second Academy Award
Academy Awards
An Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...
for All Quiet on the Western Front, a harrowing screen adaptation of the antiwar novel by Erich Maria Remarque
Erich Maria Remarque
Erich Maria Remarque was a German author, best known for his novel All Quiet on the Western Front.-Life and work:...
. His next, The Front Page
The Front Page
The Front Page is a hit Broadway comedy about tabloid newspaper reporters on the police beat, written by one-time Chicago reporters Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur which was first produced in 1928.-Synopsis:...
, brought the Ben Hecht
Ben Hecht
Ben Hecht was an American screenwriter, director, producer, playwright, and novelist. Called "the Shakespeare of Hollywood", he received screen credits, alone or in collaboration, for the stories or screenplays of some 70 films and as a prolific storyteller, authored 35 books and created some of...
/Charles MacArthur
Charles MacArthur
Charles Gordon MacArthur was an American playwright and screenwriter.-Biography:Charles MacArthur was the second youngest of seven children born to stern evangelist William Telfer MacArthur and Georgiana Welsted MacArthur. He early developed a passion for reading...
play to the screen. It earned him another Oscar nomination. His work during the 1930s and 1940s was always easily identifiable by its lighting and imaginative use of fluid camera. He worked extensively in television from the mid 1950s.
Lewis Milestone's final request before he died in 1980 was for Universal Studios to restore All Quiet on the Western Front to its original length. That request would eventually be granted nearly two decades later by Universal and other film preservation companies, and this restored version is what is widely seen today on television and home video. Milestone is interred in the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery
Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery
The Pierce Brothers Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery is a cemetery in the Westwood Village area of Los Angeles, California. It is located at 1218 Glendon Avenue in Westwood....
in Los Angeles.
Academy Awards
| Year | Award | Film | Result |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1927–28 1st Academy Awards The 1st Academy Awards ceremony, presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences , honored the best films of 1927 and 1928 and took place on May 16, 1929, at a private dinner held at the Hollywood Roosevelt Hotel, in Los Angeles, California. AMPAS president Douglas Fairbanks hosted the... |
Best Director (Comedy) | Two Arabian Knights Two Arabian Knights Two Arabian Knights is an American comedy film, directed by Lewis Milestone and starring William Boyd and Mary Astor. A silent film, Two Arabian Knights was produced by Howard Hughes and was distributed by United Artists.-Plot:... |
|
| 1929–30 3rd Academy Awards The 3rd Academy Awards were awarded to films completed and screened in 1929/1930, by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.All Quiet on the Western Front became the first film to take home both Best Picture and Best Director, something that would become common in later years.The Love... |
Best Director | All Quiet on the Western Front | |
| 1930–31 4th Academy Awards The 4th Academy Awards were awarded to films completed and screened in 1930/1931, by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. At the ceremony, nine-year-old Jackie Cooper, nominated for Best Actor in "Skippy," fell asleep on the shoulder of Best Actress nominee Marie Dressler... |
Best Director | The Front Page The Front Page (1931 film) The Front Page is a 1931 American comedy film, directed by Lewis Milestone and starring Adolphe Menjou and Pat O'Brien. Based on a Broadway play of the same name, the film was produced by Howard Hughes, written by Bartlett Cormack and Charles Lederer, and distributed by United Artists. The... |
|
| 1939 12th Academy Awards The 12th Academy Awards, honoring the best in film for 1939, was held on February 29, 1940, at a banquet in the Coconut Grove at The Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. It was hosted by Bob Hope .... |
Outstanding Production Academy Award for Best Picture The Academy Award for Best Picture is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to artists working in the motion picture industry. The Best Picture category is the only category in which every member of the Academy is eligible not only... |
Of Mice and Men Of Mice and Men (1939 film) Of Mice and Men is a 1939 film based on the novella of the same title by American author John Steinbeck. It stars Burgess Meredith, Betty Field, Lon Chaney, Jr., Charles Bickford, Roman Bohnen, Bob Steele and Noah Beery, Jr... |
|
Filmography as a writer
- 1922 - Up and at 'Em
- 1924 - The Yankee ConsulThe Yankee Consul (film)The Yankee Consul is a 1924 American black-and-white silent comedy film directed by James W. Horne and written by Raymond Cannon. With a screen adaptation by Lewis Milestone and Raymond Griffith, the film is based upon the 1904 Broadway play The Yankee Consul; a Musical Comedy by Alfred G...
- 1924 - Listen Lester
- 1925 - The Mad WhirlThe Mad WhirlThe Mad Whirl is a 1925 jazz age black-and-white silent film drama film about the "loosening of youth morals" that took place during the 1920s. Written by Edward T. Lowe Jr. and Lewis Milestone, and directed by William A. Seiter for Universal Pictures, the film stars May McAvoy and Jack...
- 1925 - Dangerous InnocenceDangerous Innocence (film)Dangerous Innocence is a 1925 black-and-white silent film comedy/romance/drama film written by Lewis Milestone and James O. Spearing based upon the novel Ann's an Idiot by Pamela Wynne. Directed by William A. Seiter for Universal Pictures, the film stars Laura La Plante and Eugene O'Brien...
- 1925 - The TeaserThe Teaser (1925 film)The Teaser is a 1925 black-and-white silent film comedy/romance/drama film written by Lewis Milestone, Edward T. Lowe Jr. and Jack Wagner based upon the play of the same name by Adelaide Matthews and Martha M. Stanley. The film was directed by William A. Seiter for Universal Pictures, and stars...
- 1925 - Bobbed HairBobbed Hair (1925 film)Bobbed Hair is a 1925 silent film comedy produced and distributed by Warner Brothers with directing by Alan Crosland. It is based on a novel written by twenty different authors...
- Also as writer/director:
- 1925 - Seven SinnersSeven Sinners (1925 film)Seven Sinners is a 1925 black-and-white silent crime comedy film directed by Lewis Milestone and written by Milestone and Darryl F. Zanuck. The film was produced by Warner Bros. Pictures....
- 1928 - Tempest
- 1930 - All Quiet on the Western FrontAll Quiet on the Western FrontAll Quiet on the Western Front is a novel by Erich Maria Remarque, a German veteran of World War I. The book describes the German soldiers' extreme physical and mental stress during the war, and the detachment from civilian life felt by many of these soldiers upon returning home from the front.The...
- 1940 - Lucky PartnersLucky PartnersLucky Partners is a 1940 comedy romance drama film directed by Lewis Milestone for RKO Radio Pictures. The film is based on the 1936 Sacha Guitry film Bonne Chance, and stars Ronald Colman and Ginger Rogers marking their first film together, and marks Rogers' eleventh and final film that was...
- 1948 - Arch of TriumphArch of Triumph (1948 film)Arch of Triumph is a 1948 American war romance film made by Enterprise Productions. The film was directed by Lewis Milestone and adapted from the 1945 Erich Maria Remarque novel Arch of Triumph....
- 1955 - La Vedova X
- 1925 - Seven Sinners