The Roots of Heaven

The son of actor Walter Huston, American film director John Marcellus Huston was born in Missouri, travelling widely with his family in vaudeville circles, he enjoyed a wild and unconventional youth.

He boxed, rode horses in Mexico and wrote for magazines in New York, before writing dialogue for Hollywood. Before breaking into directing, Huston also spent time acting and street-performing in Paris and London.

His first film, ‘The Maltese Falcon’, was made in 1941, becoming the classic adaptation, and making a star out of Humphrey Bogart. Bogart also appeared in Huston’s next few films: ‘Key Largo’, ‘Across The Pacific’ and ‘The Treasure of The Sierra Madre’.

It was with the latter that Huston won his first Best Director Oscar. His father, Walter, also appeared in the film, winning Best Supporting Actor.

Making military documentaries during World War II, Huston hit the big time again with his 1950 crime film, ‘The Asphalt Jungle’. Following this was ‘The African Queen’, which made Bogart an Oscar-winner.

Huston’s ‘Moulin Rouge’, a biopic of painter Toulouse-Latrec, was a success, winning Best Art Direction and Costume Design Oscars. In 1956, Huston embarked upon an ambitious filming of ‘Moby Dick’, with screenwriter Ray Bradbury, starring Gregory Peck as Captain Ahab.

Huston now lived in Ireland with his wife, but travelled back to complete the adaptation of Hemmingway’s ‘A Farewell To Arms’, and to direct Marilyn Monroe and Clark Gable in ‘The Misfits’ – which proved the last roles for both of these folm legends.

Huston directed Montgomery Clift as the title character in ‘Freud’, as well as ‘The List of Adrian Messinger’ and Tennessee Williams’ ‘The Night of The Iguana’.

As an actor, Huston won a Golden Globe for a supporting role in ‘The Cardinal’, and, in 1974, performed opposite Jack Nicholson, in Roman Polanski’s ‘Chinatown’.

His major comeback was in 1985 with ‘Prizzi’s Honor’, starring his daughter Angelica, in an Oscar-winning role. He also directed an adaptation of James Joyce’s ‘The Dead’ in 1987.

Unfortunately, John Huston died later that year, on 28th August, from emphysema. —bio.