Biography:A former newspaperman, Roy Del Ruth joined Mack Sennett's Keystone studios as a gag writer in 1915. It didn't take long for Del Ruth and his brother Hampton to work their way up to Sennett's directorial staff. In 1925, Del Ruth left Sennett to direct features. While his silent productions were largely unmemorable, Del Ruth's talkies are a fascinating group: he helmed the first version of The Maltese Falcon (1931), the Walter Winchell-inspired Blessed Event (1932), the archetypal Cagney vehicle Lady Killer (1933) and the Ronald Colman starrer Bulldog Drummond Strikes Back (1934), among many others. From 1935 onward, Del Ruth specialized in such star-studded musical comedies as Fox's Thanks a Million(1935) and On the Avenue (1936) and MGM's Born to Dance (1936) and DuBarry Was a Lady (1943). He briefly went "independent" in the late 1940s, serving as both producer and director of It Happened on Fifth Avenue (1947), The Babe Ruth Story (1948) and Red Light (1949). He returned toA former newspaperman, Roy Del Ruth joined Mack Sennett's Keystone studios as a gag writer in 1915. It didn't take long for Del Ruth and his brother Hampton to work their way up to Sennett's directorial staff. In 1925, Del Ruth left Sennett to direct features. While his silent productions were largely unmemorable, Del Ruth's talkies are a fascinating group: he helmed the first version of The Maltese Falcon (1931), the Walter Winchell-inspired Blessed Event (1932), the archetypal Cagney vehicle Lady Killer (1933) and the Ronald Colman starrer Bulldog Drummond Strikes Back (1934), among many others. From 1935 onward, Del Ruth specialized in such star-studded musical comedies as Fox's Thanks a Million(1935) and On the Avenue (1936) and MGM's Born to Dance (1936) and DuBarry Was a Lady (1943). He briefly went "independent" in the late 1940s, serving as both producer and director of It Happened on Fifth Avenue (1947), The Babe Ruth Story (1948) and Red Light (1949). He returned to contract servitude at Warner Bros. in the 1950s, earning quite a reputation at the studio for his abhorrence to the written word (he frequently threw a script to the ground, announcing "That's the closest I want to get to writing!") and his adherence to the techniques he'd utilized during his silent-movie years (at the end of each take, he'd turn to the script girl and ask "Were the titles all right?") Retiring abruptly in 1955, Roy Del Ruth returned with equal abruptness in 1959 to direct his two least characteristic films: the low-budget sci-fier The Alligator People (1959) and the bizarre anti-capital punishment tract Why Must I Die? (1960).…Expand
