Nicholas Ray (August 7, 1911 – June 16, 1979) was an American film director best known for the movie Rebel Without a Cause.Ray is also appreciated by a smaller audience of cinephiles for a large number of narrative features produced between 1947 and 1963 including Bigger Than Life, Johnny Guitar, They Live by Night, and In a Lonely Place, as well as an experimental work produced throughout the 1970s titled We Can't Go Home Again, which was unfinished at the time of Ray's death from lung cancer. Ray's compositions within the CinemaScope frame and use of color are particularly well-regarded. Ray was an important influence on the French New Wave, with Jean-Luc Godard famously writing in a review of Bitter Victory, "cinema is Nicholas Ray."
His films frequently explore the dark, twisted underbelly of everday suburbia
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Uses night to show solitude
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Often contrasts frustrating city life with nature, which usually brings inner peace to his protagonists
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His protagonists were usually troubled loners who cannot fit in with society, and his films greatly sympathize with them.
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Quote
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As a human being, Joan Crawford (I)' is a great actress.
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[on Robert Taylor, whom he directed in Party Girl (1958)] I was certainly impressed with Taylor's commitment. He worked for me like a true Method actor. I remember Taylor going to an osteologist, poring over X-rays and asking probing questions so that he would have an understanding of where in his body the pain would be from his character's crippled leg.
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The imagination is a pretty precious source of protection.
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[on James Dean] I had realized that, for a successful collaboration, he needed a special kind of climate. He needed reassurance, tolerance, understanding.
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The closer I get to my ending, the closer I am getting to rewriting my beginning.
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[on second wife Gloria Grahame] I was infatuated with her but I didn't like her very much.
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You like these films, but you can't imagine how often they represent only 50% of what I wanted to do. You have no idea how I had to fight to achieve even that 50%.
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[on Humphrey Bogart] He was much more than an actor: he was the very image of our condition. His face was a living reproach.
[on James Dean] The conflict between giving himself and fear of giving in to his own feelings; a vulnerability so deeply embedded that one is instantly moved, almost disturbed by it.
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[on James Cagney] Jimmy not only has a great serenity, such as I've not seen in an actor outside of Walter Huston, he has a great love of the earth and of his fellow man, an understanding of loneliness.
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If it were all in the script, why make the film?
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Fact
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In July of 2011 the University of Texas' Harry Ransom Center in Austin announced it bought Ray's voluminous archives from his widow, Susan.
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To honor the centennial of Ray's birth, the Venice International Film Festival screened his experimental film We Can't Go Home Again (1973) in August of 2011.
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Of his own films, his personal favorite was Rebel Without a Cause (1955), which is also easily his most commercially successful film. Ray was also proud of his work on They Live by Night (1948), and the fact that he had been able to "wing it" on The Lusty Men (1952). He admitted that In a Lonely Place (1950) was "a very personal film".
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Though rarely credited with a screenwriter's credit, Ray often re-wrote large portions of his scripts, usually with feedback and support from his actors. He also greatly encouraged improvisation.
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Is the subject of the song "Nicholas Ray" by Sea Ray, from their album "Stars at Noon".
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He was a good friend and protégé of Elia Kazan. They were both members of the Group Theater in the 1940s.
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In August 2007, Total Film ranked him as the 56th greatest director of all time, citing his best film as Bigger Than Life (1956).
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The marriage of his ex-wife Gloria Grahame and his son Anthony Ray caused a big scandal in Hollywood and led to a battle over custody (1960).
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Influenced a younger generation of directors, especially in Europe, such as Jean-Luc Godard and Wim Wenders.
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Prior to entering the film business, he studied architecture under Frank Lloyd Wright. As a result, many critics note his brilliant use of geography and space.
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Member of the jury at the Berlin International Film Festival in 1961
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Had a severe heart attack during the filming of 55 Days at Peking (1963) in 1962, bringing his career in movies to a premature finish.
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Went to the same high school in La Crosse, Wisconsin, as Joseph Losey.
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He worked with principally younger cast members throughout his career and always preferred hanging out with them, sharing beers with James Dean.
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Was voted the 36th Greatest Director of all time by Entertainment Weekly.
$3 Million
