Everything about King Vidor totally explained
King Wallis Vidor (
February 8,
1894 –
November 1,
1982) was an acclaimed
American film director whose career spanned eight decades.
He was born in
Galveston,
Texas, where he survived the great
Galveston Hurricane of 1900.
Career
A freelance
newsreel cameraman and cinema
projectionist, he made his debut as a director in 1913 with
Hurricane in Galveston. In
Hollywood from 1915, he worked on a variety of film-related jobs before directing a feature film,
The Turn in the Road, in 1919. A successful mounting of
Peg o' My Heart in 1922 got him a long term contract with Goldwyn Studios, later to be absorbed into
MGM. Three years later he made
The Big Parade, among the most acclaimed war films of the silent era, and a tremendous commercial success. This success established him as one of MGM's top studio directors for the next decade. In 1928, Vidor received his first Oscar nomination, for
The Crowd, widely regarded as his masterpiece and one of the greatest American silent films. In the same year, he made the classic
Show People, the last silent film of
Marion Davies, a comedy about the film industry in which Vidor had a cameo as himself.
Vidor's first sound film was
Hallelujah!, a groundbreaking film featuring an African American cast, and in which he established the new language for sound films (Which is still used today by most directors). His directorial career extended well in to the sound era and he continued making feature films until the late 1950s. Some of his better known sound films include
Stella Dallas,
Our Daily Bread,
The Citadel,
Duel in the Sun,
The Fountainhead, and
War and Peace. He directed the Kansas sequences in
The Wizard of Oz (including "
Over the Rainbow") when director
Victor Fleming had to replace
George Cukor on
Gone with the Wind, but never received screen credit.
Vidor entered in the
Guinness Book of World Records for the longest career as a film director: beginning in 1913 with
Hurricane in Galveston and ending in 1980 with a short documentary on painting entitled
The Metaphor. He was nominated five times for an
Oscar but never won in direct competition; he received an honorary award in 1979.
William Desmond Taylor
In 1967, Vidor researched the unsolved 1922 murder of fellow director
William Desmond Taylor for a possible screenplay. Vidor never published or wrote of this research during his lifetime, but biographer
Sidney D. Kirkpatrick posthumously examined Vidor's notes. He alleged in his 1986 book
Cast of Killers that Vidor had solved the sensational crime but kept his conclusions private to protect individuals still living at the time. The widely cited newsletter
Taylorology later noted over 100 factual errors in
Cast of Killers and strongly disputes Kirkpatrick's conclusions but credits the book with renewing popular interest in the crime.
Personal life
Vidor published his autobiography,
A Tree is A Tree, in 1976. This book's title is inspired by an incident early in Vidor's Hollywood career. Vidor wanted to film a movie in the locations where its story was set, a decision which would have greatly added to the film's production budget. A budget minded producer told him, "A rock is a rock. A tree is a tree. Shoot it in
Griffith Park" (a nearby public space which was frequently used for film exterior shots).
Vidor was married three times:
- Florence Arto (1917-1924); one daughter
- Eleanor Boardman (1926-1931); two daughters
- Elizabeth Hill (1932-1982)
Filmography
Hurricane in Galveston (1913)
The Grand Military Parade (1913)
The Lost Lie (1918)
Bud's Recruit (1918)
The Chocolate of the Gang (1918)
Tad's Swimming Hole (1918)
The Accusing Toe (1918)
I'm a Man (1918)
The Turn in the Road (1919)
Better Times (1919) (as King W. Vidor)
The Other Half (1919) (as King W. Vidor)
Poor Relations (1919)
The Family Honor (1920) (as King W. Vidor)
The Jack-Knife Man (1920)
The Sky Pilot (1921)
Love Never Dies (1921)
Real Adventure (1922)
Dusk to Dawn (1922)
Conquering the Woman (1922)
Peg o' My Heart (1922)
The Woman of Bronze (1923)
Three Wise Fools (1923)
Wild Oranges (1924)
Happiness (1924)
Wine of Youth (1924)
His Hour (1924)
The Wife of the Centaur (1924)
Proud Flesh (1925)
The Big Parade (1925)
La Bohème (1926)
Bardelys the Magnificent (1926)
The Crowd (1928)
The Patsy, also known as The Politic Flapper (1928)
Show People (1928)
Hallelujah! (1929)
Not So Dumb (1930)
Billy the Kid, US TV title The Highwayman Rides (1930)
Street Scene (1931)
The Champ (1931)
Bird of Paradise (1932)
Cynara, US reissue title I Was Faithful (1932)
The Stranger's Return (1933)
Our Daily Bread (1934)
The Wedding Night (1935)
So Red the Rose (1935)
The Texas Rangers (1936)
Stella Dallas (1937)
The Citadel (1938)
The Wizard of Oz (1939) (Kansas scenes only) (uncredited)
Northwest Passage (1940)
Comrade X (1940)
H.M. Pulham, Esq. (1941)
An American Romance (1944)
Duel in the Sun (1946)
On Our Merry Way, also known as A Miracle Can Happen (1948)
The Fountainhead (1949)
Beyond the Forest (1949)
Lightning Strikes Twice (1951)
Japanese War Bride (1952)
Ruby Gentry (1952)
Light's Diamond Jubilee (1954) (TV)
Man Without a Star (1955)
War and Peace (1956)
Solomon and Sheba (1959)
The Metaphor (1980)
Further Information
Get more info on 'King Vidor'.
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