Garson Kanin

At 86 years old, Garson Kanin physical status not available right now. We will update Garson Kanin's height, weight, eye color, hair color, build, and measurements.

Garson Kanin began his show-business career as a jazz musician, burlesque comedian, and actor. He graduated from the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York City and made his Broadway debut in Little Ol' Boy (1933). In 1935, Kanin was cast in a George Abbott play and soon became Abbott's assistant. Kanin made his Broadway debut as a director in 1936, at the age of 24, with Hitch Your Wagon.

In 1945, Kanin directed Spencer Tracy in Tracy's first play in 15 years. Tracy had been through a dark patch personally, culminating with a stay in hospital, and Katharine Hepburn felt that a play would help restore his focus. Tracy told a journalist in April, "I'm coming back to Broadway to see if I can still act." The play was The Rugged Path by Robert E. Sherwood, which first previewed in Providence, Rhode Island, on September 28, to a sold-out crowd and tepid response.

The Rugged Path was a difficult production, with Kanin later writing, "In the ten days prior to the New York opening, all the important relationships had deteriorated. Spencer was tense and unbending, could not, or would not, take direction". Tracy considered leaving the show before it even opened on Broadway, and lasted there just six weeks before announcing his intention to close the show. It closed on January 19, 1946, after 81 performances. Tracy later explained to a friend: "I couldn't say those goddamn lines over and over and over again every night ... At least every day is a new day for me in films ... But this thing—every day, every day, over and over again."

Kanin's 1946 play Born Yesterday, which he also directed, ran for 1,642 performances. After the draft turned in by the credited screenwriter, Albert Mannheimer proved unworkable an uncredited Kanin was brought in by Harry Cohn to adapt his play into the script used to shoot the 1950 film adaptation. His other stage work includes directing The Diary of Anne Frank (1955), which ran for 717 performances, and the musical Funny Girl (1964), which ran for 1,348 performances. Kanin wrote and directed his last play, Peccadillo, in 1985, the same year he was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame.

Virginia Downing started her career by translating his plays.

Film career

His first film as a director was A Man to Remember (1938), which The New York Times considered one of the 10 best films of 1938. Kanin was 26 at the time. His other directing credits include The Great Man Votes (1939), My Favorite Wife (1940), They Knew What They Wanted (1940), and Tom, Dick, and Harry (1941).

Kanin's Hollywood career was interrupted by the draft. He served in the United States Army from 1941 to 1945. During this time, Kanin and Carol Reed co-directed General Dwight D. Eisenhower's official record of the Allied invasion, the Academy Award-winning documentary The True Glory (1945). During this time, he began writing what would become regarded by many as his greatest play, Born Yesterday.

Kanin's best-remembered screenplays, however, were written in collaboration with his wife, actress Ruth Gordon, whom he married in 1942. Together, they wrote many screenplays, including six that were directed by George Cukor. These included the Spencer Tracy - Katharine Hepburn film comedies Adam's Rib (1949) and Pat and Mike (1952), as well as A Double Life (1947), starring Ronald Colman.

Television career

In the 1950s through the 1980s, Kanin adapted several of his stories and plays for television, most notably Mr. Broadway (1964), and Moviola (1980).

Kanin's best-selling novel Smash (1980), about the pre-Broadway tryout of a musical comedy, was inspired by his experience directing the 1964 musical Funny Girl and was adapted into the 2012 television series Smash.

Source