Mervyn LeRoy | |
|---|---|
 LeRoy in 1958 | |
| Born | October 15, 1900 San Francisco, California, U.S. |
| Died | September 13, 1987 (aged 86) |
| Resting place | Forest Lawn Memorial Park (Glendale) |
| Occupations |
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| Years active | 1928–1968 |
| Employer(s) | First National Pictures (1927–1929) Warner Bros. (1929–1938) Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (1938–1945) (1948–1954) Warner Bros. (1955–1959)[1] |
| Spouses |
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| Children | 2, including Warner |
Mervyn LeRoy (/ləˈrɔɪ/; October 15, 1900 – September 13, 1987) was an American film director, producer and actor. In his youth he played juvenile roles in vaudeville and silent film comedies.[2]
During the 1930s, LeRoy was one of the two great practitioners of economical and effective film directing at Warner Brothers studios, the other his colleague, Michael Curtiz. LeRoy's most acclaimed films of his tenure at Warners include Little Caesar (1931), I Am a Fugitive From a Chain Gang (1932), Gold Diggers of 1933 (1933) and They Won't Forget (1937).[3][4]
LeRoy left Warners and moved to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios in 1939 to serve as both director and producer. Perhaps his most notable achievement as a producer is the 1939 classic The Wizard of Oz.[5]
- ^ Finler, Joel W. (1992), The Hollywood Story (Second ed.), Mandarin, p. 458, ISBN 0-7493-0637-8
- ^ Barson, 2020
- ^ Baxter, 1970: p. 79: LeRoy "made at Warners some of the most polished and ambitious productions of the Thirties." And p. 71-72: Warner's "two great directors [of the Thirties] Mervyn Leroy and Michael Curtiz."
- ^ Barson, 2020: List LeRoy's top films of the 1930s at Warners in as "Little Caesar, I Am A Fugitive From A Chain Gang, And Gold Diggers Of 1933." And: "They Won't Forget (1937) was the most serious drama LeRoy had been given in years... the film was a powerful indictment of political ambition."
- ^ Barson, 2020: "LeRoy left Warner Brothers for the greener pastures of M-G-M, where he was offered an unusual deal that allowed him to function as either a producer or a director." And "most enduringly," his production of director Victor Fleming's Wizard of Oz.