Arthur Penn Biography

Fast Facts

• Contributed to a promotional documentary film about the 1972 Olympics, "Visions of Eight", that would go on to win numerous accolades at the 1973 Cannes Film Festival
• Drafted into the Army at 19, he would only become interested in theater after being stationed in Britain
• Quote: "Lee Strasberg ruined an entire generation of actors with that 'sense memory' crap․"
• Quote: "(Regarding the decline of his career in the 1980s) "There hasn't been much of a market for what I can do․ I'm not into outer space epics or youth pictures․""
• After numerous box office successes, he would move on to the direction of stage production, eventually helming Anne Bancroft's Broadway debut in "Two for the Seesaw"
• He would get his start in the entertainment industry as a director for numerous television dramas before breaking to film with "The Left Handed Gun" in 1958 and later the Oscar nominated film, "The Miracle Worker" in 1962
• Occasionally taught film classes at Yale University later in his career