Cecil B. DeMille

Lore & Background

Born in Ashfield, Massachusetts, and raised in New York City, DeMille began his career as a stage actor in 1900. He later began to write and direct stage plays, a few with his older brother William de Mille, and some with Jesse L. Lasky, who was then a vaudeville producer. DeMille's first film, The Squaw Man (1914), was the first full-length feature film shot in Hollywood. Its interracial love story was commercially successful, and the film marked Hollywood as the new home of the U.S. film industry. Based on continued film successes, DeMille founded Famous Players-Lasky, which was later reverse merged into Paramount Pictures with Lasky and Adolph Zukor. His first biblical epic, The Ten Commandments (1923), was both a critical and commercial success; it held the Paramount revenue record for 25 years. DeMille directed The King of Kings (1927), a biography of Jesus, which gained approval for its sensitivity and reached more than 800 million viewers. The Sign of the Cross (1932) is said to be the first sound film to integrate all aspects of cinematic technique. Cleopatra (1934) was his first film to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture. After more than 30 years in film production, DeMille reached a pinnacle in his career with Samson and Delilah (1949), a biblical epic that became the highest-grossing film of 1950. Along with biblical and historical narratives, he also directed films oriented toward 'neo-naturalism', which focused on portraying the laws of man fighting the forces of nature. DeMille received his first nomination for the Academy Award for Best Director for his circus drama The Greatest Show on Earth (1952), which won both the Academy Award for Best Picture and the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture — Drama. His 1956 remake of The Ten Commandments became his final and best-known film; also, a Best Picture Academy Award nominee, it is the eighth highest-grossing film of all time, adjusted for inflation. In addition to his Best Picture Awards, DeMille received an Academy Honorary Award for his film contributions, the Palme d'Or (posthumously) for Union Pacific (1939), a DGA Award for Lifetime Achievement, and the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award. He was the first recipient of the Golden Globe Cecil B. DeMille Award, which was named in his honor. DeMille's reputation had a renaissance in the 2010s, and his work has influenced nu

Reader's Guide

Cecil B. DeMille was of paternal Dutch ancestry. His surname was spelled de Mil before his grandfather William added an 'le' for 'visual symmetry'. As an adult, Cecil De Mille adopted the spelling DeMille because he believed it would look better on a marquee, but continued to use de Mille in private life. The family name de Mille was used by his children, Cecilia, John, Richard, and Katherine. Cecil's brother, William, and his daughters, Margaret and Agnes, as well as DeMille's granddaughter, Cecilia de Mille Presley, also used the de Mille spelling. DeMille was born on August 12, 1881, in a boarding house on Main Street in Ashfield, Massachusetts, where his parents had been vacationing for the summer. On September 1, 1881, the family returned with the newborn DeMille to their flat in New York. DeMille was named after his grandmothers, Cecilia Wolff and Margarete Blount. He was the second of three children of Henry Churchill de Mille (September 4, 1853 – February 10, 1893) and his wife, Matilda Beatrice DeMille (née Samuel; January 30, 1853 – October 8, 1923), known as Beatrice. His older brother, William C. DeMille, was born on July 25, 1878. Henry de Mille, whose ancestors were of English and Dutch Belgian descent, was a North Carolina-born dramatist, actor, and lay reader in the Episcopal Church. In New York, Henry also taught English at Columbia College (now Columbia University). He worked as a playwright, administrator, and faculty member during the early years of the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, established in New York City in 1884. Henry de Mille frequently collaborated with David Belasco in playwriting; their best-known collaborations included 'The Wife', 'Lord Chumley', 'The Charity Ball', and 'Men and Women'. Cecil B. DeMille's mother, Beatrice, a literary agent and scriptwriter, was the daughter of German Jews. She had emigrated from England with her parents in 1871 when she was 18; the newly arrived family settled in Brooklyn, New York, where they maintained a middle-class, English-speaking household. DeMille's parents met as members of a music and literary society in New York. Henry was a tall, red-headed student. Beatrice was intelligent, educated, forthright, and strong-willed. They married on July 1, 1876, despite Beatrice's parents' objections due to the young couple's differing religions; Beatrice converted to Episcopalianism. DeMille

Did You Know?

• DeMille's first film, The Squaw Man (1914), was the first full-length feature film shot in Hollywood.
• DeMille founded Famous Players-Lasky, which was later reverse merged into Paramount Pictures with Lasky and Adolph Zukor.
• Cleopatra (1934) was his first film to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture.

Notable Quotes (Wikiquote)

"Motion pictures are the most important contribution to literature and art since the invention of fiction." — Cecil B. DeMille "Who can tell what the years of the future will bring to the art of the motion picture in view of the amazing progress of the past few years." — Cecil B. DeMille "Legend rides high with history, but truth follows a lonely trail. I've pursued verity from the museum at Cairo to the smoking tepees of the Cheyennes at Lame Deer, Montana." — Cecil B. DeMille "Actors are born, and every human being is born an actor." — Cecil B. DeMille