Reminiscences of Jay Leyda, 1980

Biographical Note

Filmmaker, author; interviewee d.1988

Scope and Contents

Family and artistic background, Dayton, Ohio; assistant to Ralph Steimer, New York, N.Y., 1930; photographs in ARTS WEEKLY, 1930-31; Moscow correspondent, THEATRE ARTS MONTHLY, 1934-36; student and apprentice director under Sergei Eisenstein, editor for Eisenstein's essays and studies; assistant curator, department of film, Museum of Modern Art, New York, N.Y., 1936-40: film-acquiring trips abroad, development of Soviet film collection; cameraman, Workers Film and Photo League; film editor, Frontier Films, 1937: NATIVE LAND, MISSION TO MOSCOW, others; translator, THE FILM SENSE, 1941; editor, THE MOUSSORGSKY READER, 1947, books on Herman Melville, THE YEARS AND HOURS OF EMILY DICKINSON, 1960; catalogued Chinese Film Archive, Peking, 1959-64; work at Staatliches Filmarchiv in Berlin, Germany, 1964-69; professor of Cinema Studies, New York University, from 1974; history of film; reminiscences of many filmmakers and others in the industry

Subjects

• Authors--Interviews.
• Documentary films.
• Educators--Interviews.
• Eisenstein, Sergei, 1898-1948.
• Hogenson, Barbara, interviewer.
• Interviews.
• Leyda, Jay, 1910-1988--Interviews.
• Motion picture producers and directors--Interviews.
• Motion pictures--China.
• Motion pictures--Germany.
• Motion pictures--Soviet Union.
• Museum of Modern Art (New York, N.Y.)
• New York University.
• Oral histories (literary works)