Curtiz, Michael

Curtiz, Michael (b. Mihaly Kertész)

(1888–1962) film director; born in Budapest. He was a stage actor from 1906, then became a film actor and director in 1912. By the time he came to Hollywood in 1926, he had directed some 60 films in Europe. Working in every film genre, he made some 125 Hollywood films, winning an Academy Award for Casablanca (1943). Known for his fractured English and regarded as a production-line director, he would later gain from reappraisals of his best work.