| Billy Wilder | |
|---|---|
 Wilder at the 33rd Academy Awards | |
| 21 Nominations / 7 Wins | |
| Role | Director, Producer, Screenwriter |
| Born | June 22, 1906 |
| Sucha, Galicia, Austria-Hungary | |
| Died | March 27, 2002 |
Billy Wilder was an Austrian-born American filmmaker, screenwriter, producer, artist and journalist, whose career spanned more than 50 years and 60 films. He is regarded as one of the most brilliant and versatile filmmakers of Hollywood's golden age. Wilder is one of only five people to have won Academy Awards as producer, director and screenwriter for the same film, The Apartment, and was the first person to accomplish this. Wilder became a screenwriter in the late 1920s while living in Berlin. After the rise of the Nazi Party, Wilder, who was Jewish, left for Paris, where he made his directorial debut. From the mid-1950s on, Wilder made mostly comedies. He directed fourteen different actors in Oscar-nominated performances. Wilder was recognized with the American Film Institute (AFI) Life Achievement Award in 1986. In 1988, Wilder was awarded the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award. In 1993, he was awarded the National Medal of Arts.
Wins[]
- 18th Academy Awards, 1945
- Best Director — The Lost Weekend
- Best Screenplay — The Lost Weekend
- 23rd Academy Awards, 1950
- Best Story and Screenplay — Sunset Blvd.
- 33rd Academy Awards, 1960
- Best Director — The Apartment
- Best Picture — The Apartment (shared with I.A.L. Diamond)
- Best Story and Screenplay — The Apartment
Special and Honorary Awards[]
Nominations[]
- 12th Academy Awards, 1939
- Best Screenplay — Ninotchka (shared with Charles Brackett, Walter Reisch)
- 14th Academy Awards, 1941
- Best Original Story — Ball of Fire (shared with Thomas Monroe)
- Best Screenplay — Hold Back the Dawn (shared with Charles Brackett)
- 17th Academy Awards, 1944
- Best Director — Double Indemnity
- Best Screenplay — Double Indemnity (shared with Raymond Chandler)
- 18th Academy Awards, 1945
- Best Director — The Lost Weekend
- Best Screenplay — The Lost Weekend (shared with Charles Brackett)
- 21st Academy Awards, 1948
- Best Screenplay — A Foreign Affair (shared with Charles Brackett, Richard L. Breen)
- 23rd Academy Awards, 1950
- Best Director — Sunset Blvd.
- Best Story and Screenplay — Sunset Blvd. (shared with Charles Brackett, D.M. Marshman, Jr.)
- 24th Academy Awards, 1951
- Best Story and Screenplay — The Big Carnival (shared with Lesser Samuels, Walter Newman)
- 26th Academy Awards, 1953
- Best Director — Stalag 17
- 27th Academy Awards, 1954
- Best Director — Sabrina
- Best Screenplay — Sabrina (shared with Samuel Taylor, Ernest Lehman)
- 30th Academy Awards, 1957
- Best Director — Witness for the Protection
- 32nd Academy Awards, 1959
- Best Director — Some Like It Hot
- Best Screenplay — Some Like It Hot (shared with I.A.L. Diamond)
- 33rd Academy Awards, 1960
- Best Director — The Apartment
- Best Picture — The Apartment
- Best Story and Screenplay — The Apartment (shared with I.A.L. Diamond)
- 39th Academy Awards, 1966
- Best Story and Screenplay — The Fortune Cookie (shared with I.A.L. Diamond)
Videos[]