Biography

George Sidney

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George was the son of Louis K. Sidney the vice president of M.G.M, and Hazel Mooney of The Mooney Sisters. He began at the age of five working with Tom Mix as 'The Littlest Cowboy'. At fourteen, he was a messenger at MGM. At eighteen, he directed 'Our Gang' comedies and at twenty he moved to directing screen tests and shorts. After winning two Oscars for 'Best Short, he was promoted to feature director and won a 3rd Oscar for Best Short in 1953 ('The Merry Wives of Windsor Overture'). He held the record for 15 consecutive box office hits, some grossing $30 million in an era of 50 cent tickets. .He retired at 49 and became a paleontologist, art historian, U.S.C. law school graduate (passing his bar exam), lectured to university students and took photographs, building up an archive of over a million negatives. He was the youngest member when he joined the Directors Guild of America (known as the Screen Directors Guild) and became the youngest member of the organisation, serving for sixteen years.
- IMDb mini biography by: Tonyman 5

Co-founded and co-financed Hanna-Barbera Productions (with William Hanna, Joseph Barbera, and Columbia Pictures' Screen Gems television division) in 1957 in and was the company's president for 10 years.
Was an innovator who paired live actors like Gene Kelly on screen with animated characters like cartoon mouse Jerry in Anchors Aweigh (1945).
His second wife Jane Robinson was the widow of actor Edward G. Robinson.
His father was a prosperous Broadway producer, his mother and uncle also stage performers. He was a child actor, who appeared in vaudeville but started his film career at MGM as a messenger.
Sidney worked as a musician in vaudeville bands before joining MGM in 1932. He started with MGM as a second unit director and director of Pete Smith shorts, winning Oscars and 1940 and in 1941. On the strength of this, he was promoted to feature films as part of the Arthur Freed unit, becoming MGM's most successful director in the 1940's. Sidney was an expert in big budget musicals, but also handled rollicking swashbucklers like The Three Musketeers (1948) and Scaramouche (1952). Some of his biggest hits were movie versions of successful Broadway plays, like Annie Get Your Gun (1950) and Show Boat (1951). After leaving MGM in 1955, Sidney went over to Columbia under a seven-year contract and had one more major hit with Pal Joey (1957), made under the banner of his own production company. He simultaneously worked with, and financed, the burgeoning Hanna-Barbera cartoon company.

[on Judy Garland] The studio was very patient with her. You had to be with this great talent. I simply thought she was bored, so I would devise difficult bits of business to keep her preoccupied. But this widespread notion that the studio somehow destroyed her is nonsense. Her personal life got too much for her. I prefer to think of her as she is in "The Harvey Girls" near the peak of her talent.

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