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Howard Hawks 1896 - 1977

Howard Winchester Hawks was born on May 30, 1896 in Goshen, Elkhart County, Indiana United States. He was married to Mary Raye Keith on December 10, 1941 in New York City, New York County, New York and they later divorced in 1949 in New York City. Howard Hawks died at age 81 years old on December 26, 1977 in Palm Springs, Riverside County, CA, and was buried at Cremated. Family, friend, or fan, this family history biography is for you to remember Howard Hawks.

Howard Winchester Hawks

May 30, 1896

Goshen, Elkhart County, Indiana, United States

December 26, 1977

Palm Springs, Riverside County, California, United States

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Howard Winchester Hawks' History: 1896 - 1977

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05/30

1896

Birthday

May 30, 1896

Birthdate

Goshen, Elkhart County, Indiana United States

Birthplace

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Ethnicity & Family History

Howard Winchester Hawks was born in Goshen, Indiana. He was the first-born child of Frank Winchester Hawks (1865–1950), a wealthy paper manufacturer, and his wife, Helen Brown (née Howard; 1872–1952), the daughter of a wealthy industrialist. Hawks's family on his father's side were American pioneers and his ancestor John Hawks had emigrated from England to Massachusetts in 1630. The family eventually settled in Goshen and by the 1890s was one of the wealthiest families in the Midwest, due mostly to the highly profitable Goshen Milling Company. Hawks's maternal grandfather, C. W. Howard (1845–1916), had homesteaded in Neenah, Wisconsin in 1862 at age 17. Within 15 years he had made his fortune in the town's paper mill and other industrial endeavors. Frank Hawks and Helen Howard met in the early 1890s and married in 1895. Howard Hawks was the eldest of five children and his birth was followed by Kenneth Neil Hawks (August 12, 1898 – January 2, 1930), William Bellinger Hawks (January 29, 1901 – January 10, 1969), Grace Louise Hawks (October 17, 1903 – December 23, 1927) and Helen Bernice Hawks (1906 – May 4, 1911). In 1898, the family moved back to Neenah where Frank Hawks began working for his father-in-law's Howard Paper Company.
Military Service

Hawks began directing at age 21 after he and cinematographer Charles Rosher filmed a double exposure dream sequence with Mary Pickford. Hawks worked with Pickford and Neilan again on Amarilly of Clothes-Line Alley before joining the United States Army Air Service. Hawks's military records were destroyed in the 1973 Military Archive Fire, so the only account of his military service is his own. According to Hawks, he spent 15 weeks in basic training at the University of California in Berkeley where he was trained to be a squadron commander in the air force. When Mary Pickford visited Hawks at basic training, his superior officers were so impressed by the appearance of the celebrity that they promoted him to flight instructor and sent him to Texas to teach new recruits. Bored by this work, Hawks attempted to secure a transfer during the first half of 1918 and was eventually sent to Fort Monroe, Virginia. The Armistice was signed in November of that year, and Hawks was discharged as a Second Lieutenant without having seen active duty.
Professional Career

16 Must-See Howard Hawks Films (VIDEO) “His Girl Friday,” 1940 (*****). One of the reasons Hawks liked working with Cary Grant was his extraordinary facility with dialogue. He could whip it out fast, add flourishes and make it sing. And in this remake of play-turned-movie “The Front Page,” recast with Rosalind Russell in the male role of ace reporter Hildy Johnson, Hawks pushed his actors to perform with an exhilarating adrenaline rush. We know that newspaper editor Walter Burns still loves his ex-wife Hildy for, among other things, being a consummate reporter. He manipulates the pin-striped scribe by hooking her onto a great story–which just happens to fall into her lap–and at the same time dive-bombing her relationship with her bumbling square-jawed fiancé, played by good-hearted sap Ralph Bellamy. It’s fun watching her dive into what she’s good at–we root for the two hardboiled news junkies to get back together. “Red River,” 1948 (*****). If you don’t like “Red River,” you don’t like the movies. This was only sexy Monty Clift’s second role, and here he plays an orphaned young man who grows up under the wing of John Wayne’s gruff Thomas Dunson, a beleaguered cattle rancher with a broken heart and delusions of grandeur. But on the road to Red River, where Dunson hopes to have a better life, Matthew (Clift) turns against him, wanting a piece of the pie. The alleged off-screen romance between Clift and John Ireland, who duke it out over the size of their “revolvers,” imbues the film with a hard-to-ignore sexual tension — and for a John Wayne movie, it’s pretty steamy. Arthur Rosson codirected the film’s big set pieces, which involve a hell of a lot of cattle. “To Have and Have Not,” 1944 (*****). The story goes that Hawks bet Ernest Hemingway he could make a good film from what he regarded to be the author’s worst novel. The two ended up collaborating on the story for the Bogart-Bacall classic, which actually bears little resemblance to the original source material. Set in 1940 Martinique under the Vichy Regime, Bogie plays a fishing boat captain who warily gets involved with the smuggling of French Resistance rebels. A knockout “Slim” woman (19-year-old Bacall) catches his eye, and the rest is history, both onscreen and off. While the chemistry between the two B’s is crackling, Hoagy Carmichael almost gets away with the show as the local bar’s crooning piano player (his “Hong Kong Blues” is particularly fabulous — watch below). –Beth Hanna “Scarface,” 1932 (*****). Hawks’s first masterpiece arrived in theaters after “Little Caesar” and “The Public Enemy,” but no contemporaneous production crystallized the dark poetry of the gangster movie with such terrifying commitment as “Scarface.” Loosely based on the life of Al Capone, the film belies that notion that its director was anything but a master stylist, from the whistling shadow of Tony Camonte (Paul Muni) to a machine gun’s staccato reports turning the pages of the calendar. As the bodies pile up and Tony assumes the trappings of a robber baron, “Scarface” narrows the space between organized crime and big business to the vanishing point: money may illustrate power, but violence is capitalism’s currency. What distinguishes “Scarface” from other entries in the genre, however, is how precisely it renders a failed system’s human quotient, the near-impenetrable barriers of class. Tony, in a ghastly striped robe, played by Muni with pained fastidiousness, apes the style of princes but reveals himself ever the pauper. “Kinda gaudy, isn’t it?” his love interest, Poppy (Karen Morley), comments. “Ain’t it, though?” he says. “Glad you like it.” The billboard of the iconic final image, cruelly proclaiming “THE WORLD IS YOURS,” provides a bleak reminder that we’re all similarly desperate to buy the promise, even if we can’t afford the price. “Bringing Up Baby,” 1938 (****1/2). How much mayhem can arise when you’ve got a leopard, an irascible dog and a dinosaur skeleton on the scene? This Hawks film is the quintessential and towering classic of screwball comedies — loopy heiress Katharine Hepburn can’t shake the idea she’s in love with zoologist Cary Grant (and who can blame her), and eventually — after much tracking down of a big cat named Baby and flailing around on the bones of a brontosaurus — he can’t shake the idea either. As an actor who Hawks liked to put in drag from time to time (see: “I Was a Male War Bride”), look out for Grant’s very funny scene in a fluffy nightgown. “Ball of Fire,” 1941 (****1/2). Any screwball comedy that involves Barbara Stanwyck and a group of lexicographers is bound to entertain, and Hawks’ hilarious film about two very different worlds crashing into one another — with, well, fiery results — goes above and beyond the call of duty. Stanwyck is Sugarpuss O’Shea, a smart-mouthed nightclub singer on the lam from the mob. She shacks up with Professor Potts (Gary Cooper, in wonderful scholarly naif mode) and his wordsmith colleagues. The film nabbed four Oscar nominations, including a Best Actress nod for Stanwyck, as well as one for Billy Wilder and Thomas Monroe for Original Screenplay. “The Big Sleep,” 1946 (****1/2). Screenwriters William Faulkner, Leigh Brackett and Jules Furthman passed this screenplay around like a hot potato before it finally landed in Hawks’ lap. It’s based on Raymond Chandler’s 1939 Philip Marlowe (here, Humphrey Bogart) novel. Marlowe is tasked by the Sternwoods to chase debts before Lauren Bacall’s Vivian Rutledge pulls back the curtain on a seedy murder mystery. Their chemistry, natch, smothers the screen as it did in “To Have and Have Not,” but “Big Sleep” is also fun to watch knowing that the Hays Code hacked this one to bits. But its hothouse of sexuality is still visible. “Only Angels Have Wings,” 1939 (****). Written by frequent Hawks collaborator Jules Furthman, this aviator adventure is pure Hawks and followed up his flop “Bringing Up Baby.” It lays out many of his favorite themes: a group of men perform demanding and dangerous work at a high level. In this case Cary Grant leads a group of fliers equipped with rickety aircraft who must ferry mail and goods in and out of a treacherous canyon under variable weather conditions. They risk death every time they take off. Jean Arthur is the awkward fish out of water who wanders into this South American way station, tries to make sense of the situation and falls for aloof Grant, natch. He may still harbor feelings for his ex (Rita Hayworth), who also shows up, with her husband (Richard Barthelmess). Hawks wanted Arthur to play the role with more sensual allure–which Hayworth had in spades. But Arthur didn’t get it. After she saw Lauren Bacall in “To Have and Have Not” she told the director she should have done it his way. “Rio Bravo,” 1959 (****). This late great Hawks western rolls between ratcheting up tension and explosions of violence and quieter comic and romantic interludes. Hawks gives the mature John Wayne one of his more nuanced characters, opposite yet another of Hawks’ resourceful tough girls, exquisitely played by Angie Dickinson. She quietly softens up Wayne, forcing him to make human contact –a trope continued in several of his later films. Walter Brennan and singer Ricky Nelson make enjoyable sidekicks. “Sergeant York,” 1941 (****). Gary Cooper naturally won the Best Actor Oscar for his performance in this B&W World War I biopic about sharpshooting, overtly emotional, deeply sincere Alvin York. Many writers were involved with the screenplay, including John Huston, but “Sergeant York” fluidly tracks York’s progression from Tennessee hick to all-out, religiously reborn pacifist to decorated war hero. The real-life York, initially leery of the film, insisted that Gary Cooper, and only Gary Cooper, could play him in the movie. And it paid off. “I Was a Male War Bride,” 1949 (****). Hawks loved to rewrite the marriage plot (see the long-betrothed protagonists of “Monkey Business,” or the sharp-tongued exes of “His Girl Friday”), nowhere more explicitly than in his postwar comedy “I Was a Male War Bride.” The film places feisty American Lieutenant Catherine Gates (Ann Sheridan), not Captain Henri Rochard (Cary Grant, not even trying to sound French), quite literally in the driver’s seat: lacking the requisite motorcycling license, Rochard’s relegated to the sidecar on their journey through Central Europe. Hawks dispenses with the veneer of romantic suspense by having them marry at the halfway mark, in an astute series of dissolves between civil, military, and religious ceremonies. (“I don’t see how we could get a divorce,” Gates jokes. “It’d be something like unwinding the inside of a golf ball.”) The climax features Rochard searching for a place to sleep the night before sailing with Gates for America, turned away at every door because his status as a “male war bride” resists easy classification. It seems in retrospect a sly, keen commentary on the director’s chameleonic talents: Rochard is a man of many genres, much like Hawks himself. “Twentieth Century,” 1934 (***1/2) This trapped-on-a-cross-country-train Hollywood romance, Hawks’ only previous farce before “Bring Up Baby,” pits the great John Barrymore–grandfather of Drew–in his prime against one of the great comediennes of the silver screen, Carole Lombard, who could handle herself with anyone. He’s a show business impresario trying to recapture his mojo via his former love, now a star. These two ship-smart antagonists cross wits and wiles and exchange satisfyingly sexy banter. “Monkey Business,” 1952 (***1/2). The opening minutes of “Monkey Business” witness Edwina Fulton (Ginger Rogers) coaxing her absent-minded husband, chemist Barnaby Fulton (Cary Grant), out of his brainstorm’s clouds. Against the mad world of joyrides, honeymoon suites, and mistaken identities that Hawks and company create in this antic comedy, the sequence is a delicate soft-shoe routine, and soon the Fultons are amorous enough to let the phone ring unanswered. Indeed, though Esther, a naughty chimpanzee in Fulton’s lab, adds her elixir of youth to a water cooler, it’s never clear the formula offers much more than a placebo effect. After a day cavorting with secretary Lois Laurel (Marilyn Monroe), Barnaby describes being young again as “maladjustment, idiocy, and a series of low-comedy disasters.” This also happens to be an apt synopsis of “Monkey Business,” for at the heart of Hawks’s comic genius was his deep understanding of the genre, and of how to use the unexpected, the self-reflexive, and the utterly insane to blow it up from the inside. “The history of discovery is the history of people who didn’t follow rules,” Barnaby tells his assistant, but the motto is Hawks’s through and through. “The Thing From Another World,” 1951 (***1/2). Did Hawks direct “The Thing From Another World”? This question has gotten film experts, and the film’s cast members, all rankled for some time, as Christian Nyby ultimately got the credit for this sci-fi B-movie that inspired John Carpenter’s “The Thing.” A drive-in-style screening is perfect for this adaptation of a John W. Campbell story about the fight between the government and an elusive, rapidly growing alien species. Though the creatures, which look more like tawdry Frankenstein monsters, aren’t as frightening as Carpenter’s, Hawks’ (or whoever’s) direction, and Russell Harlan’s shadowy visuals crank up the PG-rated thrills. “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,” 1953 (***). Marilyn Monroe perfected her could-be thankless stereotype in Howard Hawks’ glittering, deceptively whip-sharp “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,” where Monroe plays the blonde, diamond-oggling yin to Jane Russell’s brunette, salty yang. Both actresses’ musical and comedic chops are on fine display here; for Monroe, look out for the sequence where she gets stuck attempting to pass her derriere through a ship’s porthole and must enlist a nine-year-old millionaire for help; meanwhile Russell owns her poolside routine basking in the glow of scantily clad male swimmers. “Air Force,” 1943 (**1/2). Produced in the aftermath of Pearl Harbor, Hawks’s wartime drama is, for better and for worse, an unapologetic product of its time. Its fictional story of the Mary-Ann, a B-17 bomber that arrives in Hawaii in the midst of the Japanese attack — unarmed and out of fuel, no less — combines thinly veiled propaganda with a perceptive treatment of servicemen’s cramped camaraderie. As the Mary-Ann’s crew (featuring John Garfield, Gig Young, and Harry Carey, among others) continues on toward the Philippines, listening in over the radio as Roosevelt declares war, Hawks forges a surprisingly graceful portrait of patriotic cheer as but one part of the coming conflict. Hardship and death portend, too, and the nobility of sacrifice cannot assuage the accompanying grief. Even in this, the most hidebound of genres, Hawks — with the exception of the film’s over-the-top air battle climax — displays the clear-eyed, personal touch that made him the cinema’s most versatile master.
12/26

1977

Death

December 26, 1977

Death date

Stroke

Cause of death

Palm Springs, Riverside County, California United States
Death location

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Obituary

Howard Hawks, the protean American director of such diverse films as “Bringing lip Baby,’ “Sergeant York,” “To Have and Have Not” and “Red River,” died Monday evening at his home in Palm Springs, Calif. His death was caused by complications from a concussion suffered in a fall several weeks ago. He was 81 years old. At the time of his death, Mr. Hawks had been making plans to return to movie‐making with a Western.. He was perhaps best known for his Westerns and aviation films, but he covered a wide spectrum of subjects, including detective stories and comedies, during his long film carder, which began in 1924, when he wrote the script for “Tiger Love.” In 1926, he directed his first film. “The Road to Diary,” with George O'Brien. His first major success came in 1932, with “The Crowd Roars,” a toughly realistic action film about racing‐car drivers, which he both wrote and directed. It starred James Cagney. The film was followed in the same year by “Scarface,” a Howard Hughes production: that was outstanding in a wave of gangster films of the early 1930's. Paul Muni was the star of “Scarface,” which drew attention to a new young actor named George Raft. Cast as one of Muni's henchmen. Among Mr. Hawks's best known aviation films were “The Dawn Patrol.” “Ceiling Zero,” “Only Angels Have Wings” and “Air Force.” Moved Into Comic Genre With the 1934 farce. “Twentieth Century.” which starred John Barrymore as a down-at-the-heels director trying to mahe a comeback, Mr. Hawks moved expertly into the comic genre. The film brought acclaim to Carole Lombard, launching her in .a highly popular succession of screwball comedies. Mr. Hawks's 1938 “Bringing Up Baby,” starring Cary Grant and Katharine Hepburn, is now considered a comic masterpiece, although it received mixed reviews at the time of its release. A third comedy hit by Mr. Hawks was “His Girl Friday,” a 1940 remake of “The Front Page,” with Mr. Grant and Rosalind Russell. He also had a commercial success with the 1953 musical, “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes,” starring Marilyn Monroe. Other films directed by Mr. Hawks included “Barbary Coast.” with Miriam Hopkins; “Come and Get It.” with Edward Arnold, Joel McCrea and Frances Farmer; “Ball of Fire,” with Gary Cooper and Barbara Stanwyck; “The Big Sleep,” with Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall; “I Was a Male War Bride,” with Cary Grant and Ann Sheridan, and “Land of the Pharaohs.” “Land of the Pharaohs” was written by the novelist William Faulkner, a close friend of Mr. Hawks, who also worked on the scripts of several of the director's other films, among them “To Have and Have Not” and “The Big Sleep.” Mr. Hawks's last film was “Rio Lobo.” in 1970, a Western starring John Wayne. one of the director's favorite actors. “For rne, the best drama is one that deals with a man in danger.” Mr. Hawks once said. and his films featured strong roles for male stars such as Mr. Bogart, Mr. Cagney and Gary Cooper, who won an Academy Award for his performance in “Sgt. York.” Of the major stars with whom he worked, Mr. Hawks once said: “They weren't all great actors, but they were great personalities. That's what I prefer. A great personality illuminates the screen. Monroe's problem was that many directors handled her as if she were real. She wasn't. She was only comfortable in unreal roles.” The director also established a number of careers for actors. Besides George Raft and Carole Lombard, Mr. Hawks helped Rita Hayworth emerge as a young siren in “Only Angels Have Wings.” An unusual piece of casting threw Montgomery Clift into prominence in “Red River,’ in which the actor, best known for his portrayal of sensitive young men, played a young cowboy taken under the wing of John Wayne. And it was in “To Have and Have Not,” her first film, that Lauren Bacall spoke in a smokey baritone the line that came to identify her: “You don't have to say anything and you don't have to do anything ... Oh. maybe just—whistle.” Under Hawks's guidance, Miss Bacall instant stardom. “He created me,” Miss Bacall said of the director: “He was a real movie maker. He loved to work with relationships. He gave actors their head and then used the reality of those situations. He gave us space. There was never any feeling of pressure, but he was not what one would call a slow director. Bogey and I had marvelous time working with him. He was one of the few directors I'd work with without seeing a script first.” Not Acting, Reacting Mr. Hawks once told an interviewer that his credo was: :'Don't annoy anyone. If I can make five good scenes and not annoy the audience, I've got a good picture.” He was as respected for his common‐sense handling of his stars and material as he was for his professionalism. During the filming of “Twentieth ‘ Century,” he was disturbed by Miss Lombard's mannered playing opposite John Barrymore. When he asked what she thought she was getting paid to do. the young actress answered, “To act.” Mr. Hawks told her to stop acting. How would she respond in real life? She said she'd kick him in the groin, and Mr. Hawks filmed the scene that way. In 1962, Mr. Hawks was the subject of a retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art. (See Raymond Rohauer) Although most of his films were box‐office successes, none won him an Academy Award. However, in 1975, he was presented with a special honorary Academy Award for his career as a giant in the American cinema.” Mr. Hawks was born in Goshen. Ind., in 1896. He graduated from Cornell University in 1917, with a degree in mechanical engineering. He attributed his method of working to that early experience: “Engineering is a process of putting everything on paper or making a visualization of your project, as it were. Being trained that way. I never make a scene without first getting a visualization of it. I have artists paint me the scene in complete detail, lighting and shading as 1 see it in my mind, working it all out on paper. Then I have something definite to go by and know what I'm doing when I hit the seat.” Fascinated by the fledgling field of film, Mr. Hawks became an assistant prop man on a Mary Pickford movie in 1917. He then entered the Army Air Corps and served in France as a second lieutenant in World War I. After a brief stint as a professional racing‐car driver, he went to Paramount. where he again worked as a prop man and went on to become a story editor. His brothers, Kenneth and William, also became directors, but they never achieved his fame. Mr. Hawks was married in 1925 to his first wife. Athole. the sister of the actress Norma Shearer. This marriage ended in divorce, as did subsequent marriages to Nancy Roe Gross and Dee Hartford. Survivors include his sons, David and Greg: his daughters, Barbara McCampbell and Kitty Tenet and four grandchildren. A memorial service is scheduled for Friday at All Saints Episcopal Church in Beverly Hills, Calif.

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Howard Hawks lived 9 years longer than the average family member when died at the age of 81.

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8 Memories, Stories & Photos about Howard

Amanda S. Stevenson

17.7k+ favorites

05/30/2023

Howard Hawks

Montage by Robert Dockery.

Date & Place: Not specified or unknown.

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Amanda S. Stevenson

17.7k+ favorites

06/03/2022

Howard Hawks

Portrait.

Date & Place: Not specified or unknown.

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Bogey and Bacall loved working with him.

Amanda S. Stevenson

17.7k+ favorites

06/03/2022

Bogey and Bacall loved working with him.

Bacall said she would agree to do any movie with Hawks even without seeing the script!

Date & Place: Not specified or unknown.

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Amanda S. Stevenson

17.7k+ favorites

06/03/2022

Howard Hawks directing Red River.

He dressed Western for the occasion.

Date & Place: Not specified or unknown.

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Amanda S. Stevenson

17.7k+ favorites

06/03/2022

Howard Hawks - Hollywood Director.

In a business suit.

Date & Place: Not specified or unknown.

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Amanda S. Stevenson

17.7k+ favorites

06/03/2022

Hepburn and Grant and Baby.

I met her 3 times. (Snubbed her the next 2 times. She said in an interview that she regretted being so mean to people because they would look at her with hurt eyes and refuse to speak to her!) Met him once and he was wonderful. Never met Baby.

Date & Place: Not specified or unknown.

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