Michael Gordon (film director)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Michael Gordon (September 6, 1909 – April 29, 1993) was an American stage actor and stage and film director.

Born in Baltimore of Jewish heritage, he was a member of the Group Theatre (1935–1940), he was blacklisted as a Communist in the days of McCarthyism. He later joined the faculty of the UCLA Theatre Arts Department. Gordon was the maternal grandfather of actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt.^[1]

Due to this, Gordon's Hollywood career neatly falls into two phases. In 1940, he started as a dialogue director and went on to direct B-movies. In the late 1940s, he distinguished himself by directing not just some action movies but also melodramas and films noir. He also directed the 1950 film version of Cyrano de Bergerac, for which José Ferrer won a Best Actor Academy Award. After a hiatus of nine years or so, he was called back to Hollywood at the end of the 1950s by producer Ross Hunter, who wanted him to direct Pillow Talk, a vehicle for Doris Day and Rock Hudson. Subsequently, Gordon's second creative phase was concerned with light-hearted comedy films.