Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/1010570
and he was the one who was held accountable by the studio for the artistic success and budgetary compliance of every production. By the end of the thirties MGM had become the world's most glamorous and prestigious studio, producing the largest body of modernist sets, with Cedric Gibbons at the very top of Art Direction's pyramid. Cedric was forty-eight years old in 1938 when Technicolor finally came to MGM. The Wizard of Oz would be the studio's first full-length color feature film. As with sound, color photography was a great challenge to master for even the most capable of Hollywood studios, requiring a retooling of many of its departments. Still an evolving technology, color management and its translation to the screen required much screen testing by the Art Directors and Scenic Artists as they proceeded to create Oz's unique and visionary art deco fantasy and world. Assigning one of Cedric's best unit Art Directors, William A. Horning, to the top position while pooling the talents and contributions of the entire Art Department, they successfully collaborated on the merging of the worlds of fantasy and reality. The Wizard of Oz proved to be the studio's biggest technical challenge and it still remains one of MGM's most popular and enduring creative legacies to the history of cinema. Film biographers and historians have not been kind when addressing the contributions and legacies of the studio system's founding generation of Supervising Art Directors, too often diminishing their roles to that of opportunists and managers who in some cases un- fairly usurped the credit of those who worked under their supervision. The truth is far different from the myths, requiring further scholarship to debunk many of the misrepresentations. C. OUR MODERN MAIDENS (MGM 1929), THE SECOND FILM IN THE ART DECO TRILOGY, CEDRIC GIBBONS, SUPERVISING ART DIRECTOR, MERRILL PYE, UNIT ART DIRECTOR. D. OUR BLUSHING BRIDES (MGM 1930), THE THIRD AND MOST ELABORATELY DESIGNED FILM OF THE ART DECO TRILOGY, CEDRIC GIBBONS, SUPERVISING ART DIRECTOR, AND MERRILL PYE, UNIT ART DIRECTOR. E. & F. THE GRAND HOTEL (MGM 1932), THE MAIN LOBBY SET. SINGLE-CARD SCREEN CREDIT FOR CEDRIC GIBBONS, ART DIRECTOR, AND ALEXANDER TOLUBOFF, ASSISTANT ART DIRECTOR. DIRECTOR EDMUND GOULDING WANTED TO LAY CARPET ON THE LOBBY FLOOR…CEDRIC GIBBONS RESPECTFULLY BUT FIRMLY SAID "NO!" G. 1930S MOTION PICTURE STUDIO WORKFLOW DIAGRAM DELINEATING THE CHAIN OF AUTHORITY AND RESPONSIBILITY DURING THE GOLDEN AGE OF THE HOLLYWOOD STUDIOS. E F G