Biografía

Could be intensely absorbed, to the point of distraction. Once was hurt falling out of a moving car because he wanted to write down an idea. He was driving at the time.

His adopted son, John Meredyth Lucas, said he spoke five languages, all of them badly. His thick Hungarian accent often made it difficult for cast and crew to understand him when he spoke English. During the filming of Casablanca (1942), for instance, he asked a set dresser for a "poodle", and when the dresser brought him a small poodle dog, Curtiz exploded at the man--he had meant that he wanted a "poodle" of water. On the set of The Cabin in the Cotton (1932), Curtiz made a speech to the actors on how he wanted them to act like "woodpeckers" when the script described them as "peckerwoods". David Niven used one of Curtiz' best-known slip-ups as the title of his memoir: "Bring On the Empty Horses". NOTE: A number of Curtiz' other misstatements were mistakenly attributed to producer Samuel Goldwyn, who was also famous for verbal slips.

His father, brother and sisters died in Auschwitz. Only his mother came to the US, thanks to Jack L. Warner, who helped him.

Credited with discovering Doris Day, whom he heard sing at a Hollywood party. At the time he was about to direct Romance en alta mar (1948) and was seeking a singer/actress to replace Betty Hutton, who had become pregnant and had to back out of the film.

Directed ten different actors in Oscar-nominated performances: Paul Muni, John Garfield, James Cagney, Walter Huston, Humphrey Bogart, Claude Rains, Joan Crawford, Ann Blyth, Eve Arden and William Powell. Cagney and Crawford won Oscars for their performances in two of Curtiz' movies.