60 Fun Facts About Elia Kazan

In which city was Elia Kazan born in 1909?

His parents came from Kayseri in Anatolia, and the family sailed for New York when he was four.

Kazan's family belonged to which ethnic community of Anatolia?

His birth name was Elias Kazantzoglou; the family sailed for New York in 1913.

Which 1951 Kazan film of a Pulitzer-winning Southern Gothic play made Marlon Brando a star?

Kazan had directed the same actor in the Broadway production; the film was the first to win three of the four acting Oscars.

Which actor made his starring debut in Kazan's 1955 film "East of Eden"?

Kazan spotted him on stage in New York and flew him to Los Angeles, the actor's first ever flight, with his clothes in a paper bag.

Kazan's 1954 film about corruption in a longshoremen's union, which won eight Oscars, was which?

It was shot in 36 days on location in New Jersey and gave Eva Marie Saint her screen debut.

Kazan won his first Best Director Oscar for which 1947 film about antisemitism, starring Gregory Peck?

Producer Darryl Zanuck reportedly took on the story after being refused membership of a country club that assumed he was Jewish.

Which acting workshop did Kazan co-found in New York in 1947?

He started it with Robert Lewis and Cheryl Crawford; Lee Strasberg took over in 1951 and made it the home of the Method.

Before which US congressional body did Kazan give the 1952 testimony that shadowed the rest of his life?

He named eight former theatre colleagues as one-time Communists and then took out a newspaper ad defending the decision.

How old was Kazan when he died in his Manhattan apartment in 2003?

He outlived almost all the colleagues he had named and the ones he had launched, from Brando to Dean.

Which actor debuted as drifter "Lonesome" Rhodes in Kazan's 1957 satire "A Face in the Crowd"?

The film was intended as a warning about television's power over politics; the character was a composite of Will Rogers, Huey Long and Arthur Godfrey.

Which actor's film debut came opposite Natalie Wood in Kazan's "Splendor in the Grass" (1961)?

During the first week of shooting he confronted Kazan about naming names, and got a two-hour justification in a dressing room.

Kazan's testimony cost him the friendship of which playwright, whose 1949 play he had directed?

The two eventually worked together again on "After the Fall" at Lincoln Center in 1964.

Which two filmmakers presented Kazan with his controversial Honorary Oscar in 1999?

Some in the audience stood and applauded, others such as Nick Nolte and Ed Harris sat on their hands, and 250 demonstrators picketed outside.

Marlon Brando's Oscar-winning role for Kazan was as ex-boxer Terry Malloy. In which New Jersey city was the film shot?

Frank Sinatra, a native of the city, had a handshake deal to play the part before Brando changed his mind.

Which composer wrote his only original film score for Kazan's 1954 longshoremen drama?

He never scored another film that was not adapted from one of his stage shows.

What nickname, short for "Gadget", did Kazan pick up at Williams College and keep for life?

He said it was because he was small, compact and handy to have around; Brando used it in his autobiography.

Where did Kazan study for two years before moving to New York in 1932?

He had already graduated cum laude from Williams College, paying his way by waiting tables and washing dishes.

Kazan's first professional home was which socially committed 1930s New York company?

Its two leaders told him at the end of his apprentice summer that whatever his talent was, it was not acting.

Kazan's role as a strike-leading taxi driver in which 1935 Odets play earned him the label 'proletarian thunderbolt'?

Critics who had been told he could not act called the performance dynamic.

Kazan's first big Broadway success was a 1942 Thornton Wilder play starring Tallulah Bankhead. Which one?

The play won Wilder a Pulitzer and Kazan the New York Drama Critics award for direction; Montgomery Clift was in the cast.

Kazan's first feature film, released in 1945, was an adaptation of which Betty Smith novel?

He had made two short films first; the feature began his habit of choosing dramas about contemporary social concerns.

Kazan's 1949 film "Pinky", one of Hollywood's first to confront racism, drew controversy for casting whom as a Black woman passing for white?

The film was still a hit and earned three Oscar nominations, for Crain, Ethel Barrymore and Ethel Waters.

Kazan's 1950 thriller 'Panic in the Streets', shot in New Orleans, is a race to stop an outbreak of what?

It was Jack Palance's film debut, and Kazan used it to give a blacklisted comedian a job.

Who won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar as Zapata's brother Eufemio in Kazan's 1952 biopic?

Kazan called it his "first real film" because of its location shooting and accents; John Steinbeck wrote the screenplay.

How many Oscar nominations did Kazan's 1951 New Orleans drama and his 1954 dockside film each receive?

The earlier film won four and the later one eight, including Best Picture.

Which actress originated Blanche DuBois on Broadway, only to be replaced by Vivien Leigh on film?

Leigh had played Blanche in London and was cast for star power; Brando, Hunter and Malden all kept their stage roles.

Which screenwriter wrote both Kazan's 1954 dockside drama and "A Face in the Crowd"?

He was Kazan's lifelong friend and thanked him at the 1982 Kennedy Center Honors for honouring "the hero in every man".

Kazan's 1956 film "Baby Doll" was condemned by which Catholic watchdog for its implied sexuality?

Carroll Baker's title character sleeps in a crib; Kazan called the swing scene his exact idea of screen eroticism.

In Kazan's 1960 film "Wild River", a matriarch refuses to sell her island to which agency?

Jo Van Fleet played the old woman and Bruce Dern made his film debut.

Kazan's 1963 film "America America" dramatises the journey to the United States of which relative?

The young man left an Anatolian village with the family's wealth on a donkey, lost it, and swept rugs in the Ottoman capital before reaching New York.

Kazan's last film, "The Last Tycoon" (1976), adapted whose unfinished novel?

The hero, Monroe Stahr, was modelled on MGM producer Irving Thalberg; De Niro dieted from 170 to 128 pounds for the part.

Who directed "A Letter to Elia", the 2010 documentary tribute to Kazan that won a Peabody Award?

The director credits Kazan's films as the reason he became a filmmaker.

Between which years had Kazan been a Communist Party USA member, the membership he was quizzed about in 1952?

He said a party trial over control of his theatre company embittered him, and the Hitler-Stalin pact finished off his faith in Moscow.

Two days after testifying, Kazan did something no other friendly witness had: what?

Historian Jon Wiener notes he also urged others to follow his example; critic Leo Braudy suspects his wife Molly wrote most of it.

Which director called Kazan "a traitor" in 1982, then added, "he is a very good director"?

He described the 1954 Brando dockside film as "a celebration of the informer".

Kazan's second wife, Barbara Loden, wrote, directed and starred in which acclaimed 1970 independent film?

It won the International Critics Award at Venice; she had earlier won a Tony playing a Marilyn Monroe figure in "After the Fall".

Kazan's first wife, script reader Molly Day Thacher, is credited with discovering which writer?

As reader for the company she awarded him a prize that launched his career; her husband later directed his greatest plays.

The title of "Splendor in the Grass" comes from a poem by which writer?

Natalie Wood's voice recites four lines from the "Intimations of Immortality" ode at the close; William Inge won the Oscar for the screenplay.

The surname Kazantzoglou combines a Turkish patronymic with a word meaning what trade?

His father did in fact become a rug merchant in New York and expected his son to inherit the business.

Kazan had a large supporting role as a flashy gangster in which 1940 James Cagney boxing film?

He acted professionally for eight years; his raffish wardrobe in the film reportedly inspired Frank Sinatra's look a decade later.

Which comedian, blacklisted after HUAC testimony, did Kazan insist on casting in "Panic in the Streets"?

Kazan called him one of the three people he rescued from the industry's blacklist, and one of the funniest men he ever met.

How many Academy Awards did actors win for performances under Kazan's direction?

They earned 24 nominations in all, and seven of his films collected 20 Oscars between them.

Kazan's 1955 Broadway 'Cat on a Hot Tin Roof' is notorious because he persuaded the playwright to do what?

He wanted Maggie more sympathetic, Big Daddy back on stage and Brick to have a moral awakening; Williams later published both versions.

Which Connecticut city, where the real case happened, refused Kazan permission to shoot 'Boomerang!' (1947)?

The story of a vagrant accused of murdering a priest was based on the case that launched future US Attorney General Homer Cummings.

Kazan's 1953 film "Man on a Tightrope" follows a circus troupe escaping from which Communist country?

It was inspired by the real Circus Brumbach's escape from East Germany, and members of that circus appeared as extras.

Which British playwright wrote the screenplay for Kazan's "The Last Tycoon"?

Sam Spiegel produced, reuniting the team behind the waterfront picture two decades on.

Which US president presented Kazan with the Kennedy Center Honors in 1982?

The tribute recognised a career that had won both a Tony and two Oscars for directing.

Who wrote Kazan's 1972 Vietnam veterans film The Visitors, and how was it shot?

It had five characters and a crew of four.

Which 1949 Broadway premiere, directed by Kazan with Lee J. Cobb, won both the Pulitzer and the Tony for Best Play?

It ran for 742 performances and has since won an unprecedented four Tonys for Best Revival.

Under what title was "America America" released in Britain?

Kazan called it his favourite of all his films and the first that was entirely his own.

Kazan's 1967 novel about a suicidal ad executive became which 1969 Kirk Douglas film?

Deborah Kerr and Faye Dunaway co-starred; the hero's real name, Topouzoglou, echoes Kazan's own family history.

What did Kazan do to the set of the 1951 Streetcar film as the story went on, instead of opening the play out?

He wanted the audience to feel the characters trapped in a room with each other, as they were on stage.

Which two leaders of Kazan's 1930s theatre company did he call "father figures"?

They told him after his apprentice summer that his talent, whatever it was, was not for acting.

In which town was Kazan's Connecticut farmhouse, where he raised four children?

The 1885 house served as the family's summer and weekend retreat until it went up for sale.

Kazan's 1954 longshoremen film drew on a Pulitzer-winning newspaper series by which reporter?

The 24 articles ran in the New York Sun in 1948, though the screenplay was based on the writer's own original story.

Which "East of Eden" co-star reportedly worked overtime to quell the young star's panic attacks?

Kazan had to house Dean in a trailer next to his own so the actor would not run off during production.

Besides 'The Unsatisfactory Supper', which one-act play did Tennessee Williams adapt into Kazan's 'Baby Doll'?

It was filmed in Benoit, Mississippi, in late 1955; Williams did not linger on set because of how the locals looked at him.

Which stage-and-film couple starred in Kazan's 1947 western "The Sea of Grass"?

MGM handed Kazan thousands of reels of stock prairie footage for the picture.

At what New York location did Kazan's acting workshop hold its first sessions in October 1947?

The space had housed a kitchen serving cheap meals to hard-up actors.

Which institution holds Kazan's film-related papers and personal archives?

Its cinema archives are open to scholars from around the world.