- Born
- Died
- Birth nameLester Anthony Minnelli
- Height5′ 9″ (1.75 m)
- Born Lester Anthony Minnelli in Chicago on February 28 1903, his father Vincent was a musical conductor of the Minnelli Brothers' Tent Theater. Wanting to pursue an artistic career, Minelli worked in the costume department of the Chicago Theater, then on Broadway during the depression as a set designer and costumer, adopting a Latinized version of his father's first name when he was hired as an art-director by Radio City Music Hall. The fall of 1935 saw his directorial debut for a Franz Schubert revue, At Home Abroad. The show was the first of three, in the best Florenz Ziegfeld Jr. spirit, before receiving Arthur Freed's offer to work at MGM. This was his second try at Hollywood -- a short unsuccessful contract at Paramount led nowhere. He stayed at MGM for the next 26 years. After working on numerous Mickey Rooney/Judy Garland vehicles, usually directed by Busby Berkeley, Arthur Freed gave him his first directorial assignment on Cabin in the Sky (1943), a risky screen project with an all-black cast. This was followed by the ambitious period piece Meet Me in St. Louis (1944) whose star Judy Garland he married in 1945. Employing first-class MGM technicians, Minnelli went on directing musicals -- The Band Wagon (1953) - as well as melodramas -- Some Came Running (1958) - and urban comedies like Designing Woman (1957), occasionally even working on two films simultaneously. Minnelli is one of the few directors for whom Technicolor seems to have been invented. Many of his films included in every one of his movies features a dream sequence.
- IMDb mini biography by: Vincent Merlaud <merlaud@studi.mathematik.hu-berlin.de>
- SpousesLee Anderson(April 1, 1980 - July 25, 1986) (his death)Denise Hale(January 15, 1962 - August 1, 1971) (divorced)Georgette Martell(February 1, 1954 - January 1, 1958) (divorced, 1 child)Judy Garland(June 15, 1945 - April 8, 1952) (divorced, 1 child)
- Children
- ParentsVincent Charles MinnelliMarie Émilie Odile Lebeau
- Invented the crab dolly, a camera dolly on wheels that can move the camera in any direction.
- Had 2 daughters: Liza Minnelli (b. March 12, 1946) with 1st ex-wife, Judy Garland & Christiane Nina Minnelli (b. May 20, 1955) with 2nd ex-wife, Georgette Martell.
- Directed seven different actors in Oscar-nominated performances: Spencer Tracy, Gloria Grahame, Kirk Douglas, Anthony Quinn, Arthur Kennedy, Shirley MacLaine and Martha Hyer. Grahame and Quinn won Oscars for their performances.
- Owns the record at the Radio City Music Hall. 17 of his films played for a record 85 weeks. Although director John Cromwell had 18 films booked into the prestigious house, his films only played a total of 36 weeks.
- [on the re-editing of "Two Weeks In Another Town"]: It's painful to talk about the ruin of that film even now.
- But I went down to Venezuela and spend a few weeks going through jungles. It's fantastic looking.
- West Side Story was terribly important because of the style of the dancing and the gangs of New York.
- But surrealism is present in most of my pictures.
- Fortunately, John Houseman is a marvelous writer and he sat in on so many story conferences. He worked with Welles, you know, and he's a marvelous man.
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