Joseph A. McDonough (October 20, 1896 in Portland, Maine – May 11, 1944 in

Hollywood Hollywood usually refers to: * Hollywood, Los Angeles, a neighborhood in California * Hollywood, a metonym for the cinema of the United States Hollywood may also refer to: Places United States * Hollywood District (disambiguation) * Hollywood, ...

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

) was an

assistant director The role of an assistant director on a film includes tracking daily progress against the filming production schedule, arranging logistics, preparing daily call sheets, checking cast and crew, and maintaining order on the set. They also have to tak ...

. He often worked with director

James Whale James Whale (22 July 1889 – 29 May 1957) was an English film director, theatre director and actor, who spent the greater part of his career in Cinema of the United States, Hollywood. He is best remembered for several horror films: ''Fran ...

Universal Studios Universal Pictures (legally Universal City Studios LLC, also known as Universal Studios, or simply Universal; common metonym: Uni, and formerly named Universal Film Manufacturing Company and Universal-International Pictures Inc.) is an Ameri ...

and

MGM Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc., also known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and abbreviated as MGM, is an American film, television production, distribution and media company owned by Amazon through MGM Holdings, founded on April 17, 1924 a ...

. Among the films he worked on with Whale at Universal were ''

Frankenstein ''Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus'' is an 1818 novel written by English author Mary Shelley. ''Frankenstein'' tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a young scientist who creates a sapient creature in an unorthodox scientific ex ...

'' (1931), '' The Old Dark House'' (1932), '' The Invisible Man'' (1933), '' Bride of Frankenstein'' (1935) and the 1936 version of '' Show Boat''. At MGM, McDonough worked with Whale on the unsuccessful ''Port of Seven Seas'' (1938), an American adaptation of the French

Marcel Pagnol Marcel Paul Pagnol (; 28 February 1895 – 18 April 1974) was a French novelist, playwright, and filmmaker. Regarded as an auteur, in 1946, he became the first filmmaker elected to the Académie française. Although his work is less fashionable ...

"Marius Trilogy". He also worked on the

W. C. Fields William Claude Dukenfield (January 29, 1880 – December 25, 1946), better known as W. C. Fields, was an American comedian, actor, juggler, and writer. Fields's comic persona was a misanthropic and hard-drinking egotist who remained a sympathe ...

- Mae West classic comedy '' My Little Chickadee'' in 1940, and on the supernatural

anthology film An anthology film (also known as an omnibus film, package film, or portmanteau film) is a single film consisting of several shorter films, each complete in itself and distinguished from the other, though frequently tied together by a single theme ...

Flesh and Fantasy ''Flesh and Fantasy'' is a 1943 American anthology film directed by Julien Duvivier and starring Edward G. Robinson, Charles Boyer, Robert Cummings, and Barbara Stanwyck. The making of this film was inspired by the success of Duvivier's previous ...

'', in 1943. In 1934, he was nominated for an Oscar, not for any one film, but for his body of work, in the category of

Best Assistant Director The Academy Awards, Academy Award for Best Assistant Director was awarded from 1933 through 1937. In the first year of this award, it referred to no specific film. * 6th Academy Awards, 1933: **Charles Barton (director), Charles Barton (Paramount) ...

, a category that would be discontinued after 1937.

References

External links

* 1896 births 1944 deaths People from Portland, Maine Film directors from Maine {{US-film-bio-stub