Nathan H. Juran
Nathan Juran ( born September 1, 1907 in Gurahumora, Bukovina, Austria - Hungary, now Romania as Nathan Hertz, † 23 October 2002 in Palos Verdes, United States) was an American production designer and film director of Austrian origin. He received the 1942 Academy Award for Best Production Design in a black and white film.
Life and work
Nathan Hertz was born in 1907 as the son of a Jewish family in the Austrian crown land Bukovina. In 1912 he emigrated with his family to the United States where he studied at the University of Minnesota and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston and graduated in Fontainebleau, France as an architect. He worked then five years in New York as an architect in 1935 and got the opportunity to go to Hollywood. There he first began to work for RKO Pictures, and starting in 1939 for 20th Century Fox as " Draftsman " ( artist, designer ). In 1941 he moved to the Art Department, where he built his career as a production designer. He first worked for two years in addition to Richard Day, which was rewarded already on her third film, Green Was My Valley with Thomas Little, the Oscar for Best Production Design in a black and white film. His Hollywood career was temporarily interrupted by the Second World War, when Juran worked as a field photographer of the OSS. Juran returned again in 1946 for the film, where he was again nominated together with Day, Little and Paul S. Fox for the scene image Oscar for The Razor's Edge - this time without success.
1948 Juran changed to Universal Pictures, where he worked with Bernard Herzbrun. Also where he got the opportunity to stage a film itself. Equipped with a medium budget, Juran debuted as a director of Black Castle (1952 ), with Boris Karloff in the title role. His work as a director convinced, Juran began his career as a film director now mostly gone.
After a few comedies, dramas and Western films, Juran took on the challenges of the fantastic and science fiction film. He began a collaboration with the famous for outstanding special effects Ray Harryhausen, from which the popular success The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad was born. In the 60s, Juran began to stage and television series.