Roger William Corman was born April 5, 1926, in Detroit, Michigan. Initially following in his father's footsteps, Corman studied engineering at Stanford University but while in school, he began to lose interest in the profession and developed a growing passion for film. Upon graduation, he worked a total of three days as an engineer at US Electrical Motors, which cemented his growing realization that engineering wasn't for him. He quit and took a job as a messenger for 20th Century Fox, eventually rising to the position of story analyst. After a term spent studying modern English literature at England's Oxford University and a year spent bopping around Europe, Corman returned to the US, intent on becoming a screenwriter/producer. He sold his first script in 1953, "The House in the Sea," which was eventually filmed and released as _Highway Dragnet . His influence on modern American cinema is almost incalculable. In 2009 he was honored with an Academy Award for Lifetime Achievement.
Brother of producer Gene Corman.
Tribute in the Memory of Film section at the Flanders International Film Festival in Ghent, Belgium.
In the early years of the American Releasing Corporation (later American International Pictures), he became one of their major sources of product for distribution. He would be given a sum of money and an advertising campaign (or somethimes just a title) and he would have to come up with the scripts and produce the films.
If he had to shoot a film on location, he would always try to shoot a second film at that same location in order to spread out the costs.
In the new decade of the 1960s, he decided that he wanted to do something that would advance his career. When American International offered him a sum of money to create another one of their low-budget black-and-white double features, he countered with an offer to use the same money to shoot a single feature in color and Cinemascope. American International finally agreed to this offer. It led to the production of House of Usher . The gamble paid off and the film became a box-office hit and generated something that was unusual for an AIP release - critical praise. This was followed by what became known as Cormans "Poe series".
A running gag in Hollywood was that Corman could negotiate the production of a film on a pay phone, shoot the film in the booth, and finance it with the money in the change slot.
Biography in: John Wakeman, editor. "World Film Directors, Volume Two, 1945-1985." Pages 234-242. New York: The H.W. Wilson Company, 1988.
His film The Little Shop of Horrors set a worlds record for the shortest shooting schedule for a feature film...Two days!.
Frequently has cameos or bit parts in the films of many successful filmmakers who got their start working for him, such as Jonathan Demme , Joe Dante and Francis Ford Coppola.
In Attack of the Bat Monsters , the character Francis Gordon, as played by Fred Ballard , is "noticeably patterned" after him.
Attended Stanford University and Oxford University.
Society of Operating Cameramen (SOC) Recipient, Governors Award (CAMMY) .
Father of Catherine Corman and uncle of Todd Corman.
Corman, as a director and/or producer, is credited with starting and/or mentoring the careers of many now-famous film directors, such as Jonathan Demme , Francis Ford Coppola , Ron Howard , John Sayles , James Cameron , Joe Dante , and Martin Scorsese , and writers such as Robert Towne and John Sayles. He also discovered/gave early roles to then-unknown actors and actresses such as Jack Nicholson , Charles Bronson , Robert De Niro , Sylvester Stallone , Talia Shire , Diane Ladd and Sandra Bullock.
Discusses his movie House of Usher in the book "A Sci-Fi Swarm and Horror Horde" (McFarland & Co., 2010) by Tom Weaver.
As an example of his influence in Hollywood, no Corman-produced movies were up for Oscars at the 1974 Academy Awards, but nearly every major category featured wins or nominations by "Corman School" graduates--those whom Corman had either started in the business or mentored early in their careers.
Although his films were notable for the flair and mobility with which he composed for widescreen, Corman revealed in "Cinema Retro" magazine (Issue #18) that he hadnt originally wanted to shoot his cult Poe series in Panavision: "I thought the anamorphic lens was better suited to westerns, whereas I was shooting in these contained little sets. But that was a decision made by AIP [American International Pictures]. They were convinced that just using that lens would not only make the pictures look bigger but sound bigger in the ads.".
Received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 7013 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, California on June 12, 1991.
His paternal grandparents, Jacob Corman and Bessie Arst, were Russian Jewish immigrants. His mother was of German ancestry.
Attended and graduated from Beverly Hills High School.
He appeared in two Best Picture Academy Award winners: The Godfather: Part II and The Silence of the Lambs .
Turned down the opportunity to direct Easy Rider .
He produced four sci-fi movies with Starfield Independent Studios: Falling Fire , Future Fear , Shepherd , and Cybermaster .
As of 2017, during his career as an actor, he has appeared in three films that were nominated for the Best Picture Oscar: The Godfather: Part II , The Silence of the Lambs and Apollo 13 . With the exception of the latter, the other two films are winners in the category.
In science-fiction films, the monster should always be bigger than the,leading lady.
I think there is always a political undercurrent in my films. With the,exception of The Intruder (1962) , I tried not to put it on the,surface.
All my films have been concerned simply with man as a social animal.
And the insurance paid out on the basis of a monsoon. But there was no,monsoon! It was just normal July weather. He went back in good weather,and made the film.
The film industry will always exist, but it will no longer be the film,industry. It will be digital or possibly virtual reality, or holograms.
I started as a writer and then I became a writer-producer. I produced,two films and I watched what the directors were doing and I simply,said: "I can do that". So, I just took over on the third film that I,produced and started directing. I watched the two directors and saw,what they were doing. I looked to other films and studied them, the way,the shots were laid out and so forth, and taught myself to direct.
Motion pictures are the art form of the 20th century, and one of the reasons is the fact that films are a slightly corrupted artform. They fit this century - they combine Art and business!.
