Biography for
Robert Wise (I) More at IMDbPro »

Date of Birth

10 September 1914, Winchester, Indiana, USA

Date of Death

14 September 2005, Los Angeles, California, USA (heart failure)

Birth Name

Robert Earl Wise

Nickname

Bobby

Height

5' 10" (1.78 m)

Mini Biography

Robert Wise was born as the youngest of three brothers. Through an odd job at RKO at the age of 19, the avid moviegoer came into film business. A head sound effects editor at the studio recognized Wise's talent, and made Wise his protégé.

Around 1941, Orson Welles was in need of an editor for Citizen Kane (1941), and Wise did a splendid job. Welles really liked his work and ideas. Wise started as a director with some B-Movies, and his career went on quickly, and he made MANY classic movies. His last theatrical film, Rooftops (1989), proved that Wise was a film maker still in full command of his craft in his 80s. The carefully composed images, tight editing, and unflagging pace make one wish that Wise had not stayed away from the camera for so long

IMDb Mini Biography By: Lukas Fichtinger

Spouse

Millicent Franklin	(29 January 1977 - 14 September 2005) (his death)
Patricia Doyle	(25 May 1942 - 22 September 1975) (her death) 1 child

Trivia

Was an avid fan of commercial Indian cinema.

1971-75: President of the Directors Guild of America (DGA).

Biography in: John Wakeman, editor. "World Film Directors, Volume One, 1890-1945." Pages 1210-1219. New York: The H.W. Wilson Company, 1987.

Directed nine different actors in Oscar-nominated performances: Nina Foch, Susan Hayward, Rita Moreno, George Chakiris, Julie Andrews, Peggy Wood, Steve McQueen, Mako, and Daniel Massey. Hayward, Moreno and Chakiris won Oscars.

1987: He accepted the Oscar for "Best Actor in a Leading Role" on behalf of Paul Newman, who wasn't present at the awards ceremony.

1982: Awarded honorary membership in the Society of Operating Cameramen (SOC).

Was the last surviving crew member of Citizen Kane (1941).

2005: Celebrated his 91st birthday the weekend prior to his death.

1998: Received the American Film Institute Life Achievement award.

Agreed to direct The Sound of Music (1965) after it had been abandoned by William Wyler on the condition that 20th Century-Fox agree to finance The Sand Pebbles (1966). Wise, who also produced the musical, won his second Best Director Oscar and the Best Picture Oscar. The next year, "The Sand Pebbles" was nominated for Best Picture and Wise was awarded the Irving Thalberg Award, the highest honor for producers.

1992: He was awarded the American National Medal of the Arts by the National Endowment of the Arts in Washington, DC.

1985-1988: President of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences.

When he and Jerome Robbins won the Best Director Oscar in 1962 for West Side Story (1961), it was the first time that a directing Oscar was shared among collaborators.

Interviewed in "It Came from Horrorwood: Interviews with Moviemakers in the SF and Horror Tradition" by Tom Weaver (McFarland, 1996).

Only three times in Academy Award history have director-collaborators been nominated for Best Directing Oscars: Wise and Jerome Robbins for West Side Story (1961), Warren Beatty and Buck Henry for Heaven Can Wait (1978) and Joel Coen and Ethan Coen for No Country for Old Men (2007). (Wise/Robbins and the Coens actually won the award).

He was made a Fellow of the British Film Institute in recognition of his outstanding contribution to film culture.

Profiled in "Conversations with Directors: An Anthology of Interviews from Literature/Film Quarterly", E.M. Walker, D.T. Johnson, eds. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2008.

Interviewed in Tom Weaver's "It Came from Weaver Five" (McFarland & Co., 1996).

2005: Retrospective at the 53rd San Sebastián International Film Festival in Spain.

In preparation for "I want to live" in which Susan Hayward is executed, he actually attended a real execution.

He has a son, Robert E. Wise, and a step-daughter, Pamela Rosenberg. He has one granddaughter.

Personal Quotes

Not true there was a cabal preventing Orson [Orson Welles] from making more films. He simply never fulfilled himself after that magnificent start, His own fault - lack of self-discipline.

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