Steel City has big connection to Oscar gold
Think of Pittsburgh, and you think of steel. But the Steel City has a big connection to gold, too -Academy Awards gold.
This year’s homegrown star is Rob Marshall, who won the Directors Guild of America award for “Chicago,” giving the city hope that it will be represented among the winners at this year’s Academy Awards.
Southwestern Pennsylvania has had its share of Oscar laureates over the years, from the obvious (Jimmy Stewart of Indiana, Pa.) to the obscure (Herb Magidson of Braddock, who won the first Oscar ever awarded for Best Song, in 1934).
Stewart later received an honorary Oscar, but even he scored only one in competition _ no more and no less than F. Murray Abraham, who was born in Pittsburgh, but left as a preschooler. And then there are those winners who are Pittsburghers only in that they attended the drama school at Carnegie Mellon University.
Leave it to the musicians to reflect the most Oscar glory on the city in which they were born or raised _ and not just that Mancini fellow from Aliquippa.
In February 1941, Jimmy Stewart won Best Actor for playing opposite Katharine Hepburn in the sophisticated comedy “The Philadelphia Story.” He sent the statue to his father, who placed it in the hardware store case that had once displayed kitchen knives.
In 1960, the Best Supporting Actress Oscar went to Shirley Jones, a native of Smithton, Westmoreland County, for her portrayal of a prostitute in the 1960 drama “Elmer Gantry.”
Frances McDormand won the Best Actress Oscar for her turn as pregnant, perceptive police chief Marge Gunderson in 1996’s “Fargo.” McDormand was born in Illinois but lived in Kentucky, Georgia, Tennessee and Illinois again before moving to Monessen, Pa., for seventh grade through high school.
Carnegie Mellon University graduate Holly Hunter was part of Oscar history in a couple of ways. She was nominated in both acting categories, as lead in 1993’s “The Piano” and supporting player in “The Firm,” as was Emma Thompson from “The Remains of the Day” and “In the Name of the Father.” Hunter won for “The Piano.”
“Amadeus” is one of eight movies to have won eight Academy Awards, and one went to F. Murray Abraham for his portrayal of composer Antonio Salieri, who seethes with envy at the genius of Tom Hulce’s bratty Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
While here in 2001 for the world premiere of “Paper Doll,” Abraham recounted that when he was born, his family lived in the Hill District. They left for El Paso when he was 3 to find better weather for his sickly older brother.
“The Silence of the Lambs,” filmed largely in Pittsburgh, became the third movie in film history to sweep the top five Oscars. It won the 1991 Best Picture award, top acting awards for Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster, directing honors for Jonathan Demme and the adapted screenplay statuette for Ted Tally.
“The Deer Hunter,” shot partly in Western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio in the summer of 1977, was crowned Best Picture and won for supporting actor Christopher Walken, director Michael Cimino, sound and film editing.
The late Charles Guggenheim won one of his four Oscars for 1989’s “The Johnstown Flood,” which commemorated the 100th anniversary of the disaster. It was honored in the category of Documentary Short Subjects.
Pittsburgh’s rich history of Oscar-winning composers begins with the winner of the very first Academy Award for Best Song: Herb Magidson, a native of Braddock, who shared the 1934 award with Con Conrad for “The Continental,” from the Fred Astaire-Ginger Rogers musical “The Gay Divorcee.”
The region’s best-known cinematic songwriter was Henry Mancini, who was born in Cleveland but raised in Aliquippa. His Oscar run started with the 1961 movie “Breakfast at Tiffany’s.” He won for score and the tune (with Johnny Mercer)that became a signature not just for him but also for crooner Andy Williams: “Moon River.” His third Academy Award came the following year, for the title song from “Days of Wine and Roses,” also with Mercer. He shared his fourth award with Leslie Bricusse for the score from the 1982 comedy “Victor/Victoria.”
Jay Livingston, a native of McDonald, and his partner Ray Evans were among the most prolific of movie songwriters. They composed for more than 100 movies (and three Broadway shows and numerous television themes) and earned seven Academy Award nominations. They won three Oscars for these winners of the Best Song category: “Que Sera, Sera,” sung by Doris Day in the Alfred Hitchcock thriller “The Man Who Knew Too Much” (1956); “Mona Lisa,” from the movie “Captain Carey, U.S.A.” (1950) and made famous by Nat “King” Cole; and “Buttons and Bows” from “The Paleface” (1948).
Two Pittsburgh Symphony conductors have won multiple Oscars, both before they forged their local connections. Andri Previn, who led the symphony from 1976-84, has four Academy Awards from his days in Tinseltown, for the scores of “Gigi,” “Porgy and Bess” (with Ken Darby), “Irma La Douce” and “My Fair Lady.”
Marvin Hamlisch, conductor of the Pittsburgh Pops since 1995, scored a rare Oscar hat trick, three awards in one year: Best Adapted Score for “The Sting,” Best Original Score for “The Way We Were” (both released in 1973) and Best Song for that film’s title tune, shared with Alan and Marilyn Bergman.
You’ve heard Bob Hope sing “Thanks for the Memories” innumerable times, but did you know a Pittsburgher co-wrote it _ and that the original title was “Thanks for the Memory”? Leo Robin shared the 1938 Best Song prize with Ralph Rainger for the tune that became Hope’s theme song, from the movie “Big Broadcast of 1938.”
Oh, what a feeling! The title song from “Flashdance,” the made-in-Pittsburgh movie about a female welder who dreams of being a dancer, won the 1983 award for Giorgio Moroder (music) and Keith Forsey and Irene Cara (lyrics).
The early, tentative steps taken by the Warner brothers (Harry, Sam, Abe and Jack) toward Hollywood occurred in Western Pennsylvania. After watching customers stream in and out of a Smithfield Street nickelodeon, Harry and Sam decided, “We’re in the movie business.”
They later operated a 99-seat nickelodeon in New Castle, Lawrence County, with chairs borrowed from an undertaker, and in 1907 formed a small distribution company in Pittsburgh: Duquesne Amusement Supply Co.
In 1912, Sam opened an office in Los Angeles, and within five years, the brothers went from ragtag film distributors to moviemakers and eventually, millionaires. In November 1966, Jack sold his interest in Warner Bros. for $32 million; his brothers were dead or retired at that point. According to the book “Hollywood Be Thy Name” by Cass Warner Sperling, Jack boasted, “Not bad for a butcher boy from Youngstown, Ohio.”
For the record, Jack Warner won the 1964 Best Picture Oscar for “My Fair Lady” and won the Irving Thalberg Memorial Award in 1959. His brother Harry won an honorary award in 1939.
David O. Selznick assured his place in movie history by producing “Gone with the Wind,” which netted him the 1939 Oscar for Best Picture (he also won the Thalberg award the same year). Selznick would go back-to-back in 1940 with Best Picture for “Rebecca.”
The Pittsburgh native was responsible for importing the film’s director, Alfred Hitchcock, from England. Selznick’s father, Lewis, was also a movie mogul, and his brother Myron was a producer and talent agent. He was the son-in-law of MGM chief Louis B. Mayer and was among Hollywood’s first independent producers.
Pandro S. Berman may not have been as well-known as Selznick, but he’s another Pittsburgh native with a long career as a producer. He is perhaps best known for making several Astaire-Rogers films and for some of MGM’s most prestigious pictures. He won the Thalberg award in 1977.
Carnegie Mellon MU graduate Ann Roth won the Oscar for Best Costume Design for the 1996 Best Picture winner, “The English Patient.” And she’s nominated again this year for another Best Picture contender, “The Hours.”
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, http://www.shns.com.)
AP-NY-03-17-03 1350EST