John Waters (October 31, 1893 â€" May 5, 1965) was an American film
director, second unit director and, initially, an assistant director.
His career began in the early days of silent film and culminated in
two consecutive Academy Award nominations in the newly instituted
category of Best Assistant Director. The second nomination, for MGM's
Viva Villa!, won him an Oscar statuette at the 7th Academy Awards on
February 27, 1935.A native of New York City, John Waters entered the
motion picture industry in its formative years. Only a few of his
assistant director credits from the 1910s have been recorded, with
vehicles for Carlyle Blackwell (The Shadow of a Doubt, 1916) and
Harold Lockwood (The Avenging Trail, 1917) listed among the earliest
titles. During this initial phase of his career, he was billed on at
least two occasions as John S. Waters and on at least one occasion as
Johnnie Waters.In 1926 he was offered a position as director with
Famous Players-Lasky and, over a two-year period, turned out ten
films, five of which (Born to the West, Forlorn River, Man of the
Forest, The Mysterious Rider and The Vanishing Pioneer) were based on
the series of popular western fiction novels by Zane Grey and starred
Famous Players' reigning western hero, Jack Holt. There were two
additional Zane Grey adaptations, Drums of the Desert (starring Warner
Baxter) and Nevada, while an eighth western, 1927's Arizona Bound,
Waters' sole sagebrush saga not based on Zane Grey, starred Gary
Cooper in his first leading role. Although he did not direct Cooper's
second starring western, The Last Outlaw, the new star's third lead
western, Nevada, was once again assigned to Waters, along with another
Cooper vehicle, the French Foreign Legion epic, Beau Sabreur, a sequel
to Famous Players' biggest hit of 1926, Beau Geste, which starred
Ronald Colman.Rounding out Waters' ten assignments was a single
comedy, the W. C. Fieldsâ€"Chester Conklin vehicle, Two Flaming
Youths, which he also produced. In 1928, a few months after Famous
Players-Lasky's September 1927 reorganization under the name Paramount
Famous Lasky Corporation, Waters left the studio to begin a lengthy
sojourn with MGM, where his initial directorial assignments consisted
of two Tim McCoy series westerns, The Overland Telegraph and Sioux
Blood which, when released in March and April 1929, respectively, were
among MGM's last silent features.
director, second unit director and, initially, an assistant director.
His career began in the early days of silent film and culminated in
two consecutive Academy Award nominations in the newly instituted
category of Best Assistant Director. The second nomination, for MGM's
Viva Villa!, won him an Oscar statuette at the 7th Academy Awards on
February 27, 1935.A native of New York City, John Waters entered the
motion picture industry in its formative years. Only a few of his
assistant director credits from the 1910s have been recorded, with
vehicles for Carlyle Blackwell (The Shadow of a Doubt, 1916) and
Harold Lockwood (The Avenging Trail, 1917) listed among the earliest
titles. During this initial phase of his career, he was billed on at
least two occasions as John S. Waters and on at least one occasion as
Johnnie Waters.In 1926 he was offered a position as director with
Famous Players-Lasky and, over a two-year period, turned out ten
films, five of which (Born to the West, Forlorn River, Man of the
Forest, The Mysterious Rider and The Vanishing Pioneer) were based on
the series of popular western fiction novels by Zane Grey and starred
Famous Players' reigning western hero, Jack Holt. There were two
additional Zane Grey adaptations, Drums of the Desert (starring Warner
Baxter) and Nevada, while an eighth western, 1927's Arizona Bound,
Waters' sole sagebrush saga not based on Zane Grey, starred Gary
Cooper in his first leading role. Although he did not direct Cooper's
second starring western, The Last Outlaw, the new star's third lead
western, Nevada, was once again assigned to Waters, along with another
Cooper vehicle, the French Foreign Legion epic, Beau Sabreur, a sequel
to Famous Players' biggest hit of 1926, Beau Geste, which starred
Ronald Colman.Rounding out Waters' ten assignments was a single
comedy, the W. C. Fieldsâ€"Chester Conklin vehicle, Two Flaming
Youths, which he also produced. In 1928, a few months after Famous
Players-Lasky's September 1927 reorganization under the name Paramount
Famous Lasky Corporation, Waters left the studio to begin a lengthy
sojourn with MGM, where his initial directorial assignments consisted
of two Tim McCoy series westerns, The Overland Telegraph and Sioux
Blood which, when released in March and April 1929, respectively, were
among MGM's last silent features.
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