Belasco was known for adding realistic elements in his plays such as real flowers, food, and aromas that could transport his audiences into the scenes. [261][262] He was known for his unique, working wardrobe which included riding boots, riding pants, and soft, open necked shirts. This occurred with Victor Mature in Samson and Delilah. [21] DeMille's sister Agnes was born on April 23, 1891; his mother nearly did not survive the birth. 21 January 1959. [240] Moreover, before his religious-themed films, many of his silent era films revolved around "husband-and-wife-divorce-and-remarry satires", considerably more adult-themed. Cecil B. DeMille photo shoot. The Squaw Man (1914), co-directed by Oscar Apfel, was a sensation and it established the Lasky Company. After more than thirty years in film production, DeMille reached a pinnacle in his career with Samson and Delilah (1949), a biblical epic which became the highest-grossing film of 1950. Heart Ailment. After the film was shown, viewers complained that the shadows and lighting prevented the audience from seeing the actors' full faces, complaining that they would only pay half price. Read More Having emerged as a potent force during the birth of Hollywood, director Cecil B. DeMille was a crucial figure in the early development of the classic Hollywood narrative filmmaking style. [293] Two schools have been named after him: Cecil B. DeMille Middle School, in Long Beach, California, which was closed and demolished in 2010 to make way for a new high school;[294] and Cecil B. DeMille Elementary School in Midway City, California. He graduated in 1900, and for graduation, his performance was the play The Arcady Trail. [108] The King of Kings established DeMille as "master of the grandiose and of biblical sagas". [204] As DeMille's career progressed, he increasingly relied on artist Dan Sayre Groesbeck's concept, costume, and storyboard art. [235] DeMille was also known for his use of special effects without the use of digital technology. [151] DeMille would reminisce into a voice recorder, the recording would be transcribed, and the information would be organized in the biography based on the topic. He was renowned for the flamboyance and showmanship of his movies. [76][77] The film grossed over ten times its budget after its New York premiere in February 1914. [185] Similar to Belasco, DeMille's theatre was revolved around entertainment, rather than artistry. [242] Another common theme in DeMille's films is the reversal of fortune and the portrayal of the rich and the poor, including the war of the classes and man versus society conflicts such as in The Golden Chance and The Cheat. Here, he parts the Red Sea. [123] The Sign of the Cross was the first film to integrate all cinematic techniques. DeMille toured with the circus while helping write the script. 77. [172], DeMille received two Academy Awards: an Honorary Award for "37 years of brilliant showmanship" in 1950[313] and a Best Picture award in 1953 for The Greatest Show on Earth. DeMille's highest-grossing films include: The Sign of the Cross (1932), Unconquered (1947), Samson and Delilah (1949), The Greatest Show on Earth (1952), and The Ten Commandments (1956). Alternative names DeMille, Cecil Blount Short description Film director: Date of birth August 12, 1881 Place of birth [154] In 1954, Secretary of the Air Force Harold E. Talbott asked DeMille for help in designing the cadet uniforms at the newly established United States Air Force Academy. View the most popular Cecil B. DeMille pix. date of death. . However, his earlier films The Captive, Kindling, Carmen, and The Whispering Chorus are more serious films. Barbara Stanwyck. (He would later cast her in The Ten Commandments.) DeMille did not believe a large movie set was the place to discuss minor character or line issues. Additionally, DeMille's epics such as The Crusades influenced Sergei Eisenstein's Alexander Nevsky. Martin Scorsese cited Unconquered, Samson and Delilah, and The Greatest Show on Earth as DeMille films that have imparted lasting memories on him. His father, Henry Churchill de Mille (1853-1893), was a North Carolina-born dramatist and lay reader in the Episcopal Church, who had earlier . DeMille told the actor that he was "one hundred percent yellow". The film was produced on a large budget of $600,000, the most expensive production at Paramount. [203], DeMille often edited in a manner that favored psychological space rather than physical space through his cuts. A censorship board called the Hays Code was established. [272] DeMille's reputation had a renaissance in the 2010s. On the day of DeMille's death, President McKay sent a telegram to the DeMille family stating that DeMille "merits the welcome, 'well done that good and faithful servant; enter thou into the rest prepared for the just.' . The legendary producer-director Cecil B. DeMille was a master of the American biblical epic who shaped the public's perceptions of Judeo-Christianity in his role as Hollywood's Sunday school teacher. His first biblical epic, The Ten Commandments (1923), was both a critical and commercial success; it held the Paramount revenue record for twenty-five years. [166] [note 11], Due to his frequent heart attacks, DeMille asked his son-in-law, actor Anthony Quinn, to direct a remake of his 1938 film The Buccaneer. [132], DeMille sued the union for reinstatement but lost. vigilantes and fulminating fanatics suffering flock shock and who wanted to shut down 1920s Hollywood because of the cause clbre scandals . Apfel. [230] Actor Charlton Heston admitted DeMille was, "terribly unfashionable" and Sidney Lumet called Demille, "the cheap version of D.W. Griffith," adding that DeMille, "[didn't have]an original thought in his head," though Heston added that DeMille was much more than that. [317], Two of DeMille's films have been selected for preservation in the National Film Registry by the United States Library of Congress: The Cheat (1915) and The Ten Commandments (1956). [100] Consequently, Beatrice deMille introduced the Famous Players-Lasky to Wilfred Buckland, who DeMille had known from his time at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, and he became DeMille's art director. The Ten Commandments gave the director a chance to play God, to film miracles. [259] He cultivated the image of the omnipotent director,[260] complete with megaphone, riding crop, and jodhpurs. Date of death: 21 January 1959 Hollywood: Cause of death: heart failure; Place of burial: Hollywood Forever Cemetery; Pseudonym: C.B. [73] Furthermore, DeMille influenced about half of Spielberg's films, including War of the Worlds. He wanted to prevent other companies from shooting on . In March 1938, he underwent a major emergency prostatectomy. [138] Despite the criticism, it was Paramount's highest-grossing film of the year. [290][note 16] Donated by the Cecil B. DeMille Foundation in 2004, the moving image collection of Cecil B. DeMille is held at the Academy Film Archive and includes home movies, outtakes, and never-before-seen test footage. [233] DeMille's 1956 version of The Ten Commandments, according to director Martin Scorsese, is renowned for its level of production and the care and detail that went into creating the film. [137] Following his surgery and the success of Union Pacific, in 1940, DeMille first used three-strip Technicolor in North West Mounted Police. Many of these displays were thought to be staged, however, as an exercise in discipline. [231], According to Scott Eyman, DeMille's films were at the same time masculine and feminine due to his thematic adventurousness and his eye for the extravagant. Gender. DeMille purchased the home in 1916 for $27,893 (Yes, five digits) and lived there with his family until his death in 1959. Cecil B. DeMille began his career as an actor on the stage in the theatrical company of Charles Frohman in 1900. Cecil B. DeMille was born on August 12, 1881 and died on January 21, 1959. On January 8, 1893, at age 40, Henry de Mille died suddenly from typhoid fever, leaving Beatrice with three children. [102] Many of his films featured scenes in two-color Technicolor. His first several films were westerns and he produced a chain of westerns during the sound era. (Cecil Blount De Mille o DeMille; Ashfield, 1881 - Hollywood, 1959) Productor y director de cine estadounidense recordado especialmente por sus superproducciones de epopeyas histricas y religiosas. He had completely adapted to the production of sound film despite the film's poor dialogue. [155], We have just lived through a war where our people were systematically executed. Beatrice DeMille's family was not in attendance, and Simon Louvish suggests that this was to conceal DeMille's partial Jewish heritage. DeMille lent Roosevelt a car for his campaign for the 1932 United States presidential election and voted for him. [148] Again, 1952's The Greatest Show on Earth became Paramount's highest-grossing film to that point. heart failure. [162] Nominated for an Academy Award for Best Picture, it grossed over $80million, which surpassed the gross of The Greatest Show on Earth and every other film in history, except for Gone with the Wind. Pictorials. Cecil B. DeMille: Film director from the United States (1881 - 1959), Actor, Writer, Film producer, Film director, Film editor, Screenwriter, Playwright, Stage actor . The wedding party was small. Groesbeck's art was circulated on set to give actors and crew members a better understanding of DeMille's vision. He was eventually introduced to Oscar Apfel, a stage director who had been a director with the Edison Company. DeMille: The Master of the American Biblical Epic . Eventually, he became manager of the agency and later, a junior partner with his mother. [187] E.H. Sothern's early influence on DeMille's work can be seen in DeMille's perfectionism. Although he is one of the most commercially successful film directors of all time, Cecil B. DeMille has for a long time been considered at best a director of . It was produced with a large budget and contained many special effects including an electronically operated giant squid. [306] DeMille received a Golden Globe Award for Best Director[314] and was additionally nominated for the Best Director category at the 1953 Academy Awards for the same film. The actual parting of the sea was created by releasing 360,000 gallons of water into a huge water tank split by a U-shaped trough, overlaying it with film of a giant waterfall that was built on the Paramount backlot, and playing the clip backwards. [citation needed] He was known as anti-union and worked to prevent unionizing of film production studios. Sitting in an IMAX In his address, he compares the exodus of the Israelites under Moses's direction to that of the Mormon . . Eventually, the Guard was enlarged to a battalion and recruited soldiers from other film studios. Birthplace: Laramie, Albany County, Wyoming, United States. [255] Andrew Sarris, a leading proponent of the auteur theory, ranked DeMille highly as an auteur in the "Far Side of Paradise", just below the "Pantheon". [298][299], DeMille's legacy is maintained by his granddaughter Cecilia DeMille Presley who serves as the president of the Cecil B. DeMille Foundation, which strives to support higher education, child welfare, and film in Southern California. "A dreadful showoff. [84] Throughout his career, DeMille would frequently remake his own films. DeMille's mother sent him to Pennsylvania Military College (now Widener University) in Chester, Pennsylvania, at age 15. In that respect, he was better than any of us. Ben Gabbe/Getty. 1 reference. [17] As a child, DeMille created an alter-ego, Champion Driver, a Robin Hood-like character, evidence of his creativity and imagination. He stands as one among the famous individuals for he was a creative filmmaker. [144], In 1942, DeMille released Paramount's most successful film, Reap the Wild Wind. DeMille directed The King of Kings (1927), a biography of Jesus, which gained approval for its sensitivity and reached more than 800million viewers. In 1923, DeMille released a modern melodrama The Ten Commandments which was a significant change from his previous stint of irreligious films. DeMille was born in Ashfield, Massachusetts, and grew up in New York City. According to Simon Louvish, these films reflected DeMille's inner thoughts and opinions about marriage and human sexuality. Charlie Chaplin lived next door for a time, and after he moved, DeMille purchased the other house and combined the estates. [10] He worked as a playwright, administrator, and faculty member during the early years of the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, established in New York City in 1884. Cecil B. DeMille. people have heard of the Ten Commandments. "[267] Salvador Dal wrote that DeMille, Walt Disney and the Marx Brothers were "the three great American Surrealists".