(From Jan. 2008:) The jury has always been out on Otto Preminger’s merits as a director —most critics see him as a minor figure, but a loyal cult following believes there are great visual and thematic qualities in pictures such as “Advise and Consent” (1962) and “In Harm’s Way” (1965). Everyone agrees Preminger was a great showman who knew how to sell his films and a fearless opponent of film censorship.
The producer-director is the subject of a juicy new Knopf biography, “Otto Preminger” by Foster Hirsch.
In his prime, Preminger was second only to Alfred Hitchcock in his ability to personally generate news stories and to book important talk show appearances for each one of his pictures. Moviegoers knew the Preminger name and face (at a time when most directors were behind the scenes figures) because he was such a frequent and amusing TV talk show guest.
Like another hammy director, John Huston, the Vienna-born Preminger took on a very high visibility acting job — as a Nazi officer in the Billy Wilder classic “Stalag 17” (1953) — that gave him a leg up on the competition.
Throughout his Hollywood heyday running roughly from the late 1940s through the early 1970s, Preminger was also well known for his dictatorial manner on the sets of his movies. Tom Tryon who starred in “The Cardinal” (1963), Dyan Cannon who starred in “Such Good Friends” (1971) and Keir Dullea of “Bunny Lake is Missing” (1965) were just three of the many actors who went public with their horror stories of being mistreated on Preminger sets.
Hirsch’s book is much juicier than the average Hollywood biography because he was able to get on-the-record interviews with actors and crew members who were more than willing to tell battle stories.
Keir Dullea pointed out to Hirsch that no actor ever gave the best performance of his or her career in a Preminger film: “How could you? Everybody was watching his back. If part of you is busy protecting yourself, you’re not in the role entirely: you can’t be. Because I was so tense my voice is in a higher register than it is in any other film…I don’t hate him; it’s too long ago. But the experience was the most unpleasant I ever had.”
According to Hirsch, Preminger only met his match in the nastiness sweepstakes a few times.
On the set of “Hurry Sundown” (1967), cast and crew couldn’t decide who was worse, Preminger or the pre-“Bonnie and Clyde” Faye Dunaway.
Tensions were already high because of the oppressive Louisiana location heat and threats from the Ku Klux Klan over the black actors staying in the same hotel with the white cast and crew:
“For the only time in his career, Preminger’s ‘whipping boy’ did not have the sympathy of the cast and crew, because Faye Dunaway, hard-bitten, competitive, and self-centered, managed to alienate everyone.”
One member of the crew reports: “She took over an air-conditioned trailer and banished dear Diahann Carroll who was to have shared the trailer with her. She made Diahann learn her lines outside the trailer, in the heat.”
“Otto Preminger” mixes gossipy anecdotes from the director’s sets with smart reassessments of the qualities of each film. Hirsch believes Preminger was always underrated and he makes a reader want to return to pictures like “Exodus” (1960) and “Advise and Consent” for another look.
