Billy Wilder

Also known as Samuel Wilder

Austrian-born American filmmaker and screenwriter (1906-2002)

AI overview

Billy Wilder was an Austrian-born American filmmaker and screenwriter who created some of the most influential films of the 20th century. His work matters because he mastered both comedy and drama, helping to define the style and sophistication of Hollywood cinema from the 1940s through the 1980s.

AI-generated from the Wikipedia summary — may contain errors.

Person · Open Library

Born: 1906
Died: 2002
Works: 37

Top works

Sunset Boulevard: Viale del tramonto
Der Prinz von Wales geht auf Urlaub
The lost weekend
The fortune cookie
The lost weekend (a Paramount picture)

via Open Library + Wikidata

Film & TV

Directing · Sucha, Galicia, Austria-Hungary

Billy Wilder, born Samuel Wilder; (22 June 1906 - 27 March 2002) was an Austrian-born director, screenwriter and producer who is regarded as one of the most successful filmmakers of Hollywood's golden age. Today he is best known for his comedies, although he also directed dramas and film noirs. Wilder is one of only five people who have won Academy Awards as producer, director, and writer for the…

Known for

Audrey — Self - Filmmaker (voice) (archive footage)2020
Hollywood's Second World War — Self (archive footage)2019
Never Be Boring: Billy Wilder — Self (archive footage)2017
Billy Wilder: Nobody's Perfect — Self (archive footage)2016
The Legacy of 'Some Like It Hot' — Self (archive footage)2006
The Making of 'Some Like It Hot' — Self (archive footage)2006
Billy Wilder Speaks — Self - Filmmaker2006
Un film et son époque — Self (archive footage)2003
Nobody's Perfect: The Making of Some Like It Hot — Self (archive footage)2001
Klaus Kinski: I'm not an actor — Self (archive footage)2000

via TMDB

Music · MusicBrainz

Type: Person
Gender: Male
Origin: United States
Active from: 1906
Active to: 2002

via MusicBrainz · CC0

Listeners · Last.fm

Listeners: 684
Total plays: 2,117

Billy Wilder (22 June 1906 – 27 March 2002) was an Austro-Hungarian-born American filmmaker, screenwriter, producer, artist, and journalist, whose career spanned more than 50 years and 60 films. He is regarded as one of the most brilliant and versatile filmmakers of Hollywood's golden age. Wilder is one of only five people who have won Academy Awards as producer, director, and writer for the same film (The Apartment). Wilder became a screenwriter in the late 1920s while living in Berlin. <a hre

via Last.fm · Billy Wilder

Recent publications · Crossref

5 total works indexed

The american rheumatism association 1987 revised criteria for the classification of rheumatoid arthritis
· 1988 · cited 15,764x
Global burden of 369 diseases and injuries in 204 countries and territories, 1990–2019: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019
· 2020 · cited 15,361x
NIA‐AA Research Framework: Toward a biological definition of Alzheimer's disease
· 2018 · cited 9,250x
The Genotype-Tissue Expression (GTEx) project
· 2013 · cited 8,418x
Global burden of 87 risk factors in 204 countries and territories, 1990–2019: a systematic analysis for the Global Burden of Disease Study 2019
· 2020 · cited 7,710x

via Crossref · CC0

Quotes

“An actor entering through the door, you've got nothing. But if he enters through the window, you've got a situation.”
“A bad play folds and is forgotten, but in pictures we don't bury our dead. When you think it's out of your system, your daughter sees it on television and says, My father is an idiot.”
“Eighty percent of a picture is writing, the other twenty percent is the execution, such as having the camera on the right spot and being able to afford to have good actors in all parts.”
“Die Österreicher haben das Kunststück fertiggebracht, aus Beethoven einen Österreicher und aus Hitler einen Deutschen zu machen.”
“I have ten commandments. The first nine are, thou shalt not bore. The tenth is, thou shalt have right of final cut.”
“I just made pictures I would've liked to see.”

via Wikiquote · CC BY-SA

Wikidata facts

Image: Gloria Swanson & Billy Wilder - ca. 1950.JPG

Show 8 more facts

Commons category: Billy Wilder
date of birth: 1906-06-22
date of death: 2002-03-27
birth name: Samuel Wilder
start of work period: 1929-00-00
name in native language: Billy Wilder
P8168: Marsac
end of work period: 1981-00-00

Sources (12)

via Wikidata · CC0

~29 min read

Article

Billy Wilder (/ˈwaɪldər/ WYLE-dər, German: [ˈvɪldɐ] ; born Samuel Wilder; June 22, 1906 – March 27, 2002) was an Austrian and American film director and screenwriter. His career in Hollywood spanned five decades, and he is regarded as one of the most versatile filmmakers of classical Hollywood cinema. He received seven Academy Awards (among 21 nominations), a BAFTA Award, the Cannes Film Festival's Palme d'Or, and two Golden Globe Awards.

Wilder was born in Sucha, Galicia, Austria-Hungary. In 1916, he moved to Vienna, where he worked as a journalist instead of attending university. Wilder's career as a screenwriter started in Berlin, where he relocated in his early adulthood. The rise of the Nazi Party and antisemitism in Germany saw him move to Paris. Wilder moved to Hollywood in 1934, and had a major hit when he, Charles Brackett, and Walter Reisch wrote the screenplay for the Academy Award-nominated film Ninotchka (1939). He established his directorial reputation and received his first nomination for the Academy Award for Best Director with Double Indemnity (1944), a film noir based on James M. Cain's novel of the same name, with a screenplay by him and Raymond Chandler. Wilder won the Best Director and Best Screenplay Academy Awards for The Lost Weekend (1945), which also won the Academy Award for Best Picture.