|
|
|
|
| Birth Name(s) : James Whale |
Date of Birth: N/A |
| Status:
Single
|
Partner:
|
| Profession:
N/A |
| << Add James Whale To Your Favorites |
|
Full James Whale Biography
James Whale (July 22, 1889 – May 29, 1957) was a ground-breaking British film director, best known for his work in the horror movie genre, making such pictures as Frankenstein, Bride of Frankenstein, and The Invisible Man.
Whale was born in Dudley, England, the sixth of the seven children of a blast furnaceman and a nurse. He was thought not strong enough to follow his brothers into the local heavy industries and started work as a cobbler. He realised some talent for signwriting and used his additional income to pay for evening classes at the Dudley School of Arts and Crafts.
In October 1915, with World War I underway, he enlisted for the Army and was commissioned second lieutenant. He was taken a prisoner of war in August 1917 and, while imprisoned, he continued his love of drawing and sketching but discovered a talent for staging theatrical productions.
After the armistice he returned to Birmingham and embarked on a professional stage career. In 1928 he was offered the opportunity to direct two fringe performances of R. C. Sherriff's then unknown play Journey's End starring the young, and hardly better known, Laurence Olivier. The play was a remarkable success and transferred to the West End (now with a young Colin Clive in the lead role) where it played for 600 performances. Whale also directed the Broadway stage version and a Hollywood film adaptation of the play. Clive reprised his role in the film.
Whale was best known for his work in the horror genre, making such momentous and iconic pictures as Frankenstein, Bride of Frankenstein and The Invisible Man.
In his later days, Whale experienced difficulty with his memory due to a debilitating stroke. He became lonely and suffered from depression and had difficulty putting the war behind him. He committed suicide by drowning himself in his swimming pool on May 29, 1957 at the age of 67. As his suicide note was originally withheld (and first published in James Curtis's biography of the director), circumstances of his death were not known until years later. His suicide note read, "The future is just old age and illness and pain... I must have peace and this is the only way."
James Whale was openly gay during his time in Hollywood. The fictionalized film Gods and Monsters featured this aspect of his personality, his amateur painting, his medical condition, his mental health, and his emotional condition.
A memorial statue was erected for Whale in 2002 in the grounds of a new multiplex cinema of his home town, Dudley, England. The statue depicts a roll of film with the face of Frankenstein's monster engraved into the cells and the names of his most famous films etched into the film-tin shaped base-stone.James Whale memorial statue in Dudley, England. |
|
|
| Add James Whale Biography (SuperUSERS) + |
| Add James Whale Review/Comment
|
HQ James Whale Pictures (1) | Random James Whale Picture
|
| << Back to the James Whale Homepage |
|
