Merritt B. Gerstad

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Merritt B. Gerstad (born July 5, 1900 in Chicago , Illinois , † March 1, 1974 in Laguna Beach , California ) was an American cameraman .

Life

Merritt B. Gerstad first shot a film as a cameraman for director Victor Heerman in 1920 with the silent film comedy The Poor Simp . Initially working for the Selznick Pictures Corporation, he moved to Universal Studios in 1924 and to MGM in 1926 , where he began working with director Tod Browning on several occasions . Together they made the Lon Chaney films The Road to Mandalay (1926), The Unknown (1927) and At Midnight (1927) as well as the horror film Freaks (1932). Other directors who directed Gerstad included Jack Conway , Clarence Brown , Harry Beaumont , Mervyn LeRoy and WS Van Dyke .

In the early days of the sound film era, he worked several times as a cameraman for films in which William Haines and Ramón Novarro each played the leading role. From 1932 he worked for all of the major film studios, again for Universal, for Columbia Pictures , 20th Century Fox , Paramount Pictures , RKO Pictures and Warner Brothers . With Watch on the Rhine (1943), Conflict (1945) and Rhapsodie in Blau (1945), Warner made the last films in which he was involved as a cameraman. In the course of his career he made a number of comedies, such as Sam Woods Marx Brothers film Scandal in the Opera (1935), but also film dramas such as Henry King's Seventh Heaven (1937) with Simone Simon and James Stewart in the leading roles . Even Henry Hathaway's Adventure Souls at Sea (1937) with Gary Cooper is one of his works.

Filmography (selection)

  • 1920: The Poor Simp
  • 1924: The Man from Wyoming
  • 1925: Dangerous Innocence
  • 1926: The Road to Mandalay
  • 1927: The Unknown ( The Unknown )
  • 1927: The Taiga Son ( Mockery )
  • 1927: At midnight ( London After Midnight )
  • 1928: Circus Babies ( Circus Rookies )
  • 1928: The Lady Behind the Curtain ( A Certain Young Man )
  • 1929: Gold hunter in California ( Tide of Empire )
  • 1929: The Bridge of San Luis Rey
  • 1929: Wonder of Women
  • 1929: Navy Blues
  • 1929: The youngest lieutenant ( Devil-May-Care )
  • 1930: Our Blushing Brides
  • 1930: The Singer of Seville ( Call of the Flesh )
  • 1930: Those Three French Girls
  • 1931: The Great Lover

Web links

Commons : Merritt B. Gerstad  - Collection of images, videos and audio files