Jean Negulesco

Former painter turned Hollywood director who moved to the US in 1927 and began his film career as a sketch artist for title designs and montage sequences. Negulesco later worked as an assistant producer, second unit director and co-screenwriter before making his first directorial effort, "Singapore Woman," in 1941. Negulesco did some of his finest directing for Warner Bros. in the 1940s, showing a flair for polished melodrama and film noir. The complexly plotted "The Mask of Dimitrios" (1944) was an admirable showcase for a debuting Zachary Scott and the Warner Bros. stock company, while "Three Strangers" (1946) brought together the formidable trio of Peter Lorre, Sydney Greenstreet and Geraldine Fitzgerald in an unusual tale of cross and double-cross. Negulesco's talents for showcasing his female stars was confirmed with the touching Ida Lupino vehicle, "Deep Valley" (1947) and the admirably adult "Johnny Belinda" (1948) in which Jane Wyman gave a memorable Oscar-winning performance as a deaf-mute rape victim.