John Eliot Sturges (/?st?rd??s/; January 3, 1910 – August 18, 1992) was an American film director. His movies include Bad Day at Black Rock (1955), Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (1957), The Magnificent Seven (1960), The Great Escape (1963) and Ice Station Zebra (1968). The Great Escape was entered into the 3rd Moscow International Film Festival. He was not related to director Preston Sturges.
After successfully working with Walter Newman on an eleventh hour rewrite of "Underwater," Sturges recruited the screenwriter for "The Magnificent Seven." Newman objected to how Sturges filmed several of his scenes and became furious when Sturges gave some of Yul Bryner's carefully crafted, character-driven lines to Steve McQueen and Charles Bronson. Livid about it, Newman asked that his name be removed from the credits. However, just a few years later Newman and Sturges reteamed for "The Great Escape." Newman felt Sturges was "dilatory" with his preparation of the script and felt the studio unjustly blamed him, not Sturges, for its delay. Again, another argument with Sturges resulted in Newman's name being taken off the script. A final proposed attempt at a collaboration based on unfilmed portions of James A. Michener's "Tales of the South Pacific" was never done.
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He specialized in robust action pictures, particularly westerns. He excelled at bringing to life tautly written stories about tough characters facing difficult circumstances. Conversely, just as often, he failed to redeem poorly written material, turning out an equally inadequate picture. Throughout his career he regularly alternated hits (such as Last Train from Gun Hill (1959), The Magnificent Seven (1960), The Great Escape (1963), The Eagle Has Landed (1976)) with misses (such as The Old Man and the Sea (1958), By Love Possessed (1961), A Girl Named Tamiko (1962), The Hallelujah Trail (1965)). He has also been criticized for his lack of stylistic trademarks, though his best films remain exciting to watch.
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He began his directing career at Columbia Pictures, where from 1946-49 he he worked on "12-day wonders" ("B" pictures shot on a 12-day schedule). From there he moved on to MGM where for another six years he directed more "B" pictures, albeit on a larger budget. He established an independent production company in 1959, releasing through United Artists. From 1960-67 he worked under contract for United Artists. His first major hit was the western Bad Day at Black Rock (1955) (a pet project of MGM production head Dore Schary), which he shot in just three weeks, wrapping up virtually every scene in a single take. His motto was, "Take one for spontaneity".
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He served his apprenticeship in the blueprint department at RKO and was promoted to office assistant, after inventing a filing system nobody else could understand. He then learned the new Technicolor process under the designer Robert Edmund Jones. As there were few specialists in the field, he was eventually hired as a colour consultant by David O. Selznick to work on "The Garden of Allah" for $300 per week.
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First worked as a stage manager for the San Rafael Players.
Served with the US Army Signals Corps during World War II, but later transferred to the Air Force. Eventually edited/directed 37 training films and five documentaries. He served in Africa, Italy, Corsica and Britain.
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Attended Marin College on a $14-a-week football scholarship.
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Came from a family of distinguished lawyers and architects.
He was the original director of Wild Is the Wind (1957), but on March 15, 1957--only a week before shooting was scheduled to begin--he withdrew from the film due to illness, according to contemporary news items. George Cukor took over direction and stated years later in a interview that Sturges left the project to replace Fred Zinnemann on The Old Man and the Sea (1958), but a Cukor biography states that Sturges left the project when it became apparent that the film would be more of a love story than an action picture.
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The Magnificent Seven (1960) was a major inspiration for Stephen King when writing his fifth Dark Tower novel, "Wolves of the Calla. In reference to the film's director, King named the beleaguered farming village Calla Bryn Sturgis.
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When he met Akira Kurosawa, Kurosawa told him that he loved The Magnificent Seven (1960), which was a remake of Kurosawa' Seven Samurai (1954). Sturges always maintained that this was the single proudest moment of his life.
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Biography in: John Wakeman, editor. "World Film Directors, Volume One, 1890-1945." Pages 1079-1085. New York: The H.W. Wilson Company, 1987.
$13 Million
