Biography

French-born Benjamin Carré was a classically-trained artist who had studied at the Atelier Amable in Paris. He started out professionally as a scene painter for the Paris Opera and the Comédie-Francaise (1901-06). Looking to find work in the fledgling film business, he joined Pathé-Gaumont as a set designer and initially worked on five feature films. Carré entered the U.S. in 1912 and soon found further gainful employment as a production designer at Eclair/Peerless, renowned at the time for having one of the most state-of-the-art studio facilities on the East Coast. Working out of Ft. Lee, New Jersey, he enjoyed a successful collaboration with a fellow Parisian, the renowned director Maurice Tourneur. For the remainder of the decade, Carré was under contract at MGM (1924-26), Warner Brothers (1926-27), Fox (1928-35) and, again, MGM (1939-44). His best work is exemplified by the production design of the subterranean chambers and backstage setting of The Phantom of the Opera (1925), the Emerald City from The Wizard of Oz (1939) and the home of the Smith family in Meet Me in St. Louis (1944).

In addition to his film work, Carré was a prodigious painter and exhibitor of water colours featuring Los Angeles cityscapes. He also designed murals for the General Motors Pavilion at the New York World's Fair in 1969. Due primarily to ill-health, Carré retired from art direction in 1937 but continued to work on background painting and the creation of miniatures.
- IMDb mini biography by: I.S.Mowis