Albert Lewin(1894-1968)

He graduated from New York University with a B.A. in English, followed by a Masters in English from Harvard University, and subsequently taught at the University of Missouri from 1916 to 1918. He would have gone on to a professorship, if not for a chance viewing of El gabinete del Dr. Caligari (1920), which persuaded him to enter the film business. Initially, he was employed by the Jewish Tribune as a drama and film critic, then as a reader for Samuel Goldwyn, and as a script clerk for King Vidor. He joined MGM in 1924, after his first scenario was accepted. He became head of the MGM script department in 1929, and personal assistant to Irving Thalberg before working as an associate producer on several key MGM films in the 1930s.

[on casting the leading role in El retrato de Dorian Gray (1945)]: One day, I received a message from Cedric Gibbons, who wanted to see me on a matter of urgency and secrecy. Gibby was the only close friend of Greta Garbo around the studio, and he had been deputed to tell me that Garbo wanted to play Dorian. Indeed, it was the only role she would come back to the screen for. Of course, I moved heaven and earth to set it up. But everyone had a fit: the censorship problem, formidable anyway, would have become insurmountable with a woman.