George Cukor

One of the most respected directors of Hollywood's Golden Age, Oscar-winning filmmaker George Cukor was frequently described as a "women's director," thanks to his stellar collaborations with Katherine Hepburn on ten films, including "The Philadelphia Story" (1940), as well as Joan Crawford on "The Women" (1939), Ingrid Bergman on "Gaslight" (1944), Judy Holliday on "Born Yesterday" (1950), Judy Garland on "A Star is Born" (1957) and Audrey Hepburn on "My Fair Lady" (1964). The appellation, while appropriate, did not sufficiently explain the scope of Cukor's five-decade career; rather, it was his scrupulous attention to every detail of his films - from pace and design to casting, scripting and editing - that created a fluid, flawless aesthetic that remained almost invisible to viewers until after the final credits rolled. Though he worked in all genres - from comedies and dramas to musicals - his true focus was the complicated entanglement of relationships between friends and lovers in the face of political, social and interpersonal conflicts. In doing so, Cukor crafted a body of work that represented some of the finest pictures ever released by Hollywood studios; pictures that stood the test of time and changing audiences, who returned to Cukor's cinematic offerings in order to see a master craftsman at work.