| To honor contributions of legendary Production Designers and Art
Directors of the past, the Art Directors Guild has established a Hall
of Fame that inducts new members into its ranks at the Annual Awards
Banquet.
John Box (1920-2005) was nicknamed "the magician' and
received an Academy Award after he created a snowy Russia while on location
in scorching Spain for Doctor Zhivago (1966). For The Inn
of the Sixth Happiness (1958) he built a Chinese wall in Wales and
for Rollerball (1975) he designed the arena and devised the game.
Box is known for his collaborations with famed director David Lean, beginning
with the film Lawrence of Arabia (1962), for which he won the
Academy Award in 1963. Box was a graduate of the London School of Architecture.
He began his career as an architect and stage designer, turning to films
during the mid-1950s. Box is best known for creating exotic foreign settings
and making the repulsive and lifeless look lively, colorful and exciting.
Other Academy Awards came for Oliver! (1968) and Nicholas
and Alexandra (1971). Box won BAFTA Awards for A Man For All
Seasons (1966), The Great Gatsby (1974) and Rollerball
(1975) and was nominated for Oliver! (1968), Nicholas and
Alexandra (1971) and A Passage to India (1984).
Hans Dreier (1885-1966) won Academy Awards for his work on Frenchman's
Creek (1944), Samson and Delilah (1949) and Sunset Blvd
(1950). Dreier's production designs contributed to the development
of a new genre, screwball comedy, which was influenced by a combination
of Europeans and Americans from the past and present. Dreier used these
designs in collaborations with famed director Ernest Lubitsch in the films
Forbidden Paradise (1924), The Love Parade (1929) and
Trouble in Paradise (1932). He was also known for his collaborations
with famed director Josef von Sternberg on the film Underworld (1927),
one of the most influential films of the late silent era. Dreier was born
in Germany, where he studied architecture and later worked as a supervising
architect for the German Imperial Government in West Africa. In 1919 Dreier
began to work on films at UFA in Berlin. He moved to Hollywood in 1923
to work at Paramount Studios where he served as supervising art director
until his retirement in 1950. Other films earning him Academy Award nominations
include The Patriot (1928), The Vagabond King (1930),
The Love Parade (1929), Morocco (1930), A Farewell
to Arms (1932), The Lives of a Bengal Lancer (1935), Souls
at Sea (1937), If I Were King (1938), Beau Geste (1939),
North West Mounted Police (1940), Arise, My Love (1940),
Hold Back the Dawn (1941), Reap the Wild Wind (1942),
For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)and Kitty (1945).
Cedric Gibbons (1892-1960) received 37 Academy Award nominations,
more than any other art director in Hollywood. He won 11 Academy Awards
for The Bridge of San Luis Rey (1929), The Merry Widow
(1934), Pride and Prejudice (1940), Blossoms In the Dust
(1941), Gaslight (1944), The Yearling (1946), Little
Woman (1949), An American in Paris (1951), The Bad and
the Beautiful (1952), Julius Caesar (1953) and Somebody
Up There Likes Me (1956). Gibbons is one of the most celebrated and
influential production designers in the history of American film. He
is one of the 36 founders of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences
and designed the Oscar statuette. Gibbons was born
in Brooklyn, New York, where he studied art and commercial design at the
Art Students League. He began working in 1914 as an art director for the
Edison Studios. In 1924 Gibbons joined the staff at MGM as the supervising
art director along with Richard Day, and remained there for 32 years.
Gibbons and Day redefined Art Deco, creating the legacy of "big white"
sets and influencing American interior design. His name has appeared in
the credits of over 1500 films, more than any other person in the history
of motion pictures.
Jan Scott (1915-2003) is the winner of more Primetime Emmy Awards
(11) than any other production designer or woman in the history of the
television industry. She received a record 30 Primetime Emmy nominations.
Scott is a past Art Directors Guild president. She also served as a vice
president, second vice president and governor of the Academy of Television
Arts & Sciences and was a member of the Academy of Motion Pictures
Arts & Sciences. Scott was recognized as both an innovator in production
design for the mini-series format and a trailblazer in a field once dominated
by men. During the course of her long career she successfully crossed
over from television to theatrical film production design to work on six
theatrical films (including Rich and Famous and The World
of Henry Orient). She has designed for romance and slapstick
movies as well as docu-dramas. Scott was born
in Carbondale, Illinois. She studied Architecture and Fine Arts at the
University of Chicago and continued her education at the Art Institute
of Chicago and MIT. Among the productions for which Scott won Emmy Awards
for art direction were Eleanor & Franklin: The White
House Years (1977), Foxfire (1987), Evergreen
(1985), Studs Lonigan (1979), I'll Be Home for Christmas
(1988), and Hallmark Hall of Fame (1951).
Alexandre Trauner (1906-1993) was invited to Hollywood by director
Billy Wilder to work on The Apartment (1960) for which he won an Academy
Award. His career as a production designer began in the late 20's as assistant
to Lazare Meerson. Meerson was the creator of poetic realism, a cinematic
style of art direction using studio sets over real locations and a metaphorical
style, which mirrored character and action. Trauner was an advocate of
this style throughout his career. Trauner (who was Jewish) went into hiding
when the Nazis invaded France, but still worked uncredited on films. This
is when he began his collaborations with Marcel Carne, a leading French
Director. Trauner was born in Budapest and studied
art in Paris. He received an Academy Award nomination for The Man Who
Would Be King (1975). Trauner won Cesar Awards for Monsieur Klein
(1976), Don Giovanni (1979) and Subway (1985), and received
nominations for Coup de Torchon (1981), La Truite (1982),
Tchao Pantin (1983) and 'Round Midnight (1986).
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