Marvin Levy (publicist)
Marvin Levy | |
---|---|
Born | (1928-11-16) November 16, 1928 (age 95) New York City, NY, U.S. |
Occupation | Film publicist |
Years active | 1949–present |
Marvin Levy (born November 16, 1928) is an American publicist, specialized in marketing and public relations. He is most noted for having been a long time marketer for director Steven Spielberg at Amblin Entertainment.
Biography
Early life
Levy graduated from New York University in 1949 and began his career in New York City. Actually entering the advertising sector, he got a job at a radio station, for which he collected questions and answers for a quiz show. Shortly thereafter, he became the publisher of the first Tex McCrary and Jinx Falkenburg talk shows; he was later fired due to cuts, but received a letter of recommendation, successfully completing his work at the New York Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer office in the Advertising and Exploitation Department. He was entrusted with the task of promoting films in New York and conducting promotional campaigns with local stars, including for films awarded with the Best Picture Oscar like Gigi and Ben-Hur.[1]
Moving to Hollywood
In 1962, Levy moved to the public relations company Blowitz, Thomas and Canton, one of the main sales points outside the Hollywood studio system; once BTC disbanded in 1974, Levy moved to the West Coast. Due to a merger with American International Pictures, Levy moved to Columbia Pictures in the first months of 1975. With the commercialization of great films such as Taxi Driver, The Deep and Kramer vs. Kramer, Levy has climbed the hierarchy of the film marketing department of Columbia Pictures. One of the productions he marketed at the time was Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Steven Spielberg's first film after the success of Jaws.
From Amblin to DreamWorks
Spielberg and Levy got along so well that Spielberg increasingly relied on Levy's advice in the following years and Levy became a father figure for him. In 1982, Spielberg was at the zenith in Hollywood and Levy moved to Spielberg's production company Amblin Entertainment to represent it exclusively. He has directed marketing and public relations at Amblin for twelve years. When Spielberg founded DreamWorks Pictures in 1994 with Jeffrey Katzenberg and David Geffen, Levy moved there.
In 1994, Levy received the Les Mason award, the highest award from the Local 600 International Cinematographers Guild (Film Marketer Association).
He has been a member of the Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences at the Public Relations Branch from 1991 to 2002 and again since 2004.
In 2018, at the age of 90, he became the first publicist who received an Honorary Academy Award for an exemplary career in publicity that has brought films to the minds, hearts and souls of audiences all over the world.[2]
Partial filmography[3]
- Gigi (1958)
- Ben-Hur (1959)
- Taxi Driver (1976)
- Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
- The Deep (1977)
- Kramer vs. Kramer (1979)
- Back to the Future (1985)
- Back to the Future Part II (1989)
- Back to the Future Part III (1990)
- Jurassic Park (1993)
- Schindler's List (1993)
- The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1996)
- Saving Private Ryan (1998)
- American Beauty (1999)
- Gladiator (2000)
- A Beautiful Mind (2001)
- Munich (2005)
- War Horse (2011)
- Lincoln (2012)
- Bridge of Spies (2015)
- The Post (2017)
References
- ^ "Honorary Oscar recipient Marvin Levy can't believe his luck". AP news. November 15, 2018. Retrieved October 19, 2019.
- ^ "Governors Awards: By Honoring Marvin Levy, Academy Recognizes Its Debt to PR Experts". The Hollywood Reporter. November 17, 2018. Retrieved October 19, 2019.
- ^ "Meet the team". Amblin.
External links
- Marvin Levy at IMDb
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- Warner Bros. / Charlie Chaplin (1928)
- Walt Disney (1932)
- Shirley Temple (1934)
- D. W. Griffith (1935)
- The March of Time / W. Howard Greene and Harold Rosson (1936)
- Edgar Bergen / W. Howard Greene / Museum of Modern Art Film Library / Mack Sennett (1937)
- J. Arthur Ball / Walt Disney / Deanna Durbin and Mickey Rooney / Gordon Jennings, Jan Domela, Devereaux Jennings, Irmin Roberts, Art Smith, Farciot Edouart, Loyal Griggs, Loren L. Ryder, Harry D. Mills, Louis Mesenkop, Walter Oberst / Oliver T. Marsh and Allen Davey / Harry Warner (1938)
- Douglas Fairbanks / Judy Garland / William Cameron Menzies / Motion Picture Relief Fund (Jean Hersholt, Ralph Morgan, Ralph Block, Conrad Nagel) / Technicolor SA (1939)
- Bob Hope / Nathan Levinson (1940)
- Walt Disney, William Garity, John N. A. Hawkins, and the RCA Manufacturing Company / Leopold Stokowski and his associates / Rey Scott / British Ministry of Information (1941)
- Charles Boyer / Noël Coward / Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (1942)
- George Pal (1943)
- Bob Hope / Margaret O'Brien (1944)
- Republic Studio, Daniel J. Bloomberg, and the Republic Studio Sound Department / Walter Wanger / The House I Live In / Peggy Ann Garner (1945)
- Harold Russell / Laurence Olivier / Ernst Lubitsch / Claude Jarman Jr. (1946)
- James Baskett / Thomas Armat, William Nicholas Selig, Albert E. Smith, and George Kirke Spoor / Bill and Coo / Shoeshine (1947)
- Walter Wanger / Monsieur Vincent / Sid Grauman / Adolph Zukor (1948)
- Jean Hersholt / Fred Astaire / Cecil B. DeMille / The Bicycle Thief (1949)
- Louis B. Mayer / George Murphy / The Walls of Malapaga (1950)
- Gene Kelly / Rashomon (1951)
- Merian C. Cooper / Bob Hope / Harold Lloyd / George Mitchell / Joseph M. Schenck / Forbidden Games (1952)
- 20th Century-Fox Film Corporation / Bell & Howell Company / Joseph Breen / Pete Smith (1953)
- Bausch & Lomb Optical Company / Danny Kaye / Kemp Niver / Greta Garbo / Jon Whiteley / Vincent Winter / Gate of Hell (1954)
- Samurai I: Musashi Miyamoto (1955)
- Eddie Cantor (1956)
- Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers / Gilbert M. "Broncho Billy" Anderson / Charles Brackett / B. B. Kahane (1957)
- Maurice Chevalier (1958)
- Buster Keaton / Lee de Forest (1959)
- Gary Cooper / Stan Laurel / Hayley Mills (1960)
- William L. Hendricks / Fred L. Metzler / Jerome Robbins (1961)
- William J. Tuttle (1964)
- Bob Hope (1965)
- Yakima Canutt / Y. Frank Freeman (1966)
- Arthur Freed (1967)
- John Chambers / Onna White (1968)
- Cary Grant (1969)
- Lillian Gish / Orson Welles (1970)
- Charlie Chaplin (1971)
- Charles S. Boren / Edward G. Robinson (1972)
- Henri Langlois / Groucho Marx (1973)
- Howard Hawks / Jean Renoir (1974)
- Mary Pickford (1975)
- Margaret Booth (1977)
- Walter Lantz / Laurence Olivier / King Vidor / Museum of Modern Art Department of Film (1978)
- Hal Elias / Alec Guinness (1979)
- Henry Fonda (1980)
- Barbara Stanwyck (1981)
- Mickey Rooney (1982)
- Hal Roach (1983)
- James Stewart / National Endowment for the Arts (1984)
- Paul Newman / Alex North (1985)
- Ralph Bellamy (1986)
- Eastman Kodak Company / National Film Board of Canada (1988)
- Akira Kurosawa (1989)
- Sophia Loren / Myrna Loy (1990)
- Satyajit Ray (1991)
- Federico Fellini (1992)
- Deborah Kerr (1993)
- Michelangelo Antonioni (1994)
- Kirk Douglas / Chuck Jones (1995)
- Michael Kidd (1996)
- Stanley Donen (1997)
- Elia Kazan (1998)
- Andrzej Wajda (1999)
- Jack Cardiff / Ernest Lehman (2000)
- Sidney Poitier / Robert Redford (2001)
- Peter O'Toole (2002)
- Blake Edwards (2003)
- Sidney Lumet (2004)
- Robert Altman (2005)
- Ennio Morricone (2006)
- Robert F. Boyle (2007)
- Lauren Bacall / Roger Corman / Gordon Willis (2009)
- Kevin Brownlow / Jean-Luc Godard / Eli Wallach (2010)
- James Earl Jones / Dick Smith (2011)
- D. A. Pennebaker / Hal Needham / George Stevens Jr. (2012)
- Angela Lansbury / Steve Martin / Piero Tosi (2013)
- Jean-Claude Carrière / Hayao Miyazaki / Maureen O'Hara (2014)
- Spike Lee / Gena Rowlands (2015)
- Jackie Chan / Lynn Stalmaster / Anne V. Coates / Frederick Wiseman (2016)
- Charles Burnett / Owen Roizman / Donald Sutherland / Agnès Varda (2017)
- Marvin Levy / Lalo Schifrin / Cicely Tyson (2018)
- David Lynch / Wes Studi / Lina Wertmüller (2019)
- Samuel L. Jackson / Elaine May / Liv Ullmann (2021)
- Euzhan Palcy / Diane Warren / Peter Weir (2022)
- Angela Bassett / Mel Brooks / Carol Littleton (2023)