Miloš Forman

Jan Tomáš Forman (18 February 1932 – 14 April 2018), known as Miloš Forman, was a Czech American film director, screenwriter, actor, and professor, who until 1968 lived and worked primarily in former Czechoslovakia.

Spouses

Jana Brejchová (m. 1958; div. 1962)
Vera Kresadlova-Formanova (m. 1964; div. 1999)
Martina Zborilova-Forman (m. 1999; death 2018)

Forman was one of the most important directors of the Czechoslovak New Wave. His 1967 film The Fireman's Ball, on the surface a naturalistic representation of an ill-fated social event in a provincial town, was seen by both movie scholars and authorities in Czechoslovakia as a biting satire on Eastern European Communism, resulting in it being banned for many years in Forman's home country.

Since Forman left Czechoslovakia, two of his films, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Amadeus, have acquired particular renown, each of which gained him an Academy Award for Best Director. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest was the second film to win all five major Academy Awards (Best Picture, Actor in Leading Role, Actress in Leading Role, Director, and Screenplay) following It Happened One Night in 1934, an accomplishment not repeated until 1991 by The Silence of the Lambs. Forman was also nominated for a Best Director Oscar for The People vs. Larry Flynt. He also won Golden Globe, Cannes, Berlinale, BAFTA, Cesar, David di Donatello, European Film Academy, and Czech Lion awards.

Personal life

Actress Hana Brejchová was Forman's 18-year-old former sister-in-law at the time she was given her first film role in his international success Loves of a Blonde, which earned her 3rd place in the Best Actress category at the Venice Film Festival.

Forman was born in Čáslav, Czechoslovakia (present-day Czech Republic), the son of Anna (née Švábová), who ran a summer hotel. When young, he believed his biological father to be Rudolf Forman, a professor. Both Rudolf and Anna, a professor and housewife, respectively, were Protestant. They died in Nazi concentration camps and he was reared by two uncles and family friends. During the Nazi occupation, as a member of the anti-Nazi Underground, Rudolf Forman died while being interrogated by the Gestapo. Rudolf was arrested for distributing banned books and died in the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp in 1944. Forman's mother died in Auschwitz in 1943. Forman has stated that he did not fully understand what had happened to them until he saw footage of the concentration camps when he was 16.

Forman lived with relatives during World War II and later discovered that his biological father was in fact a Jewish architect, Otto Kohn, a survivor of the Holocaust. He has a brother, Pavel Forman, 12 years older, a Czech painter who, after the 1968 invasion, emigrated to Australia. In his youth, he wanted to become a theatrical producer, bypassing theater. Through his biological father, he is a half-brother of mathematician Joseph J. Kohn.

After the war, Forman attended the elite King George boarding school in the spa town Poděbrady, where his fellow students included Václav Havel, the Mašín brothers and future film-makers Ivan Passer and Jerzy Skolimowski. He later studied screenwriting at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague. He was assistant of Alfred Radok, creator of Laterna Magika. During the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia in summer 1968, he left Europe for the United States.

Forman's first wife was Czech movie star Jana Brejchová. They met during the making of the movie Štěňata(1957). They divorced in 1962. Forman has twin sons with his second wife, Czech actress Věra Křesadlová-Formanová. They separated in 1969. Both sons, Petr Forman and Matěj Forman, born 1964, are involved in the theatre. Then Forman married Martina Zbořilová on November 28, 1999. They also have twin sons, Jim and Andy (born 1999, named for comics Jim Carrey and Andy Kaufman), and reside in Connecticut, USA.

He was professor emeritus of film at Columbia University.

The asteroid 11333 Forman was named after Forman in 1996.

In 2009 a documentary film about Forman directed by Miloš Šmídmajer was produced – Miloš Forman: Co te nezabije....

Forman has written poems and published an autobiography called Turnaround in 1994.

Forman died at Danbury Hospital near his home in Warren, Connecticut after a short illness on 14 April 2018 at the age of 86.

Career

Along with future favorite cinematographer Miroslav Ondříček and longtime schoolfriend Ivan Passer, Forman filmed the silent documentary Semafor about Semafor theater. Forman's first important production was the documentary Audition whose subject was competing singers. He directed several Czech comedies in Czechoslovakia. However, during the Prague Spring and the ensuing 1968 invasion, he was in Paris negotiating the production of his first American film. His employer, a Czech studio, fired him, and he then decided to move to the United States. He moved to New York, where he later became a professor of film at Columbia University in 1978 and co-chair (with his former teacher František Daniel) of Columbia's film department. One of his protégés was future director James Mangold, whom Forman had mentored at Columbia.

In 1977, he became a naturalized citizen of the United States.

In 1985 he headed the Cannes film festival and in 2000 did the same for the Venice festival. He presided over a ceremony of Caesar in 1988.

In 1997, he received the Crystal Globe award for outstanding artistic contribution to world cinema at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival. Forman performed alongside actor Edward Norton in Norton's directorial debut, Keeping the Faith (2000), as the wise friend to Norton's conflicted priest.

In April 2007 he took part in the jazz opera Dobře placená procházka, itself a remake of the TV film he made in 1966. It premiered at the Prague National Theatre, directed by Forman's son, Petr Forman.

Forman received an honorary degree in 2009 from Emerson College in Boston, USA.[22]

He regularly collaborated with cinematographer Miroslav Ondříček.

Films Loves of a Blonde

Loves of a Blonde is one of the best–known movies of Czechoslovak New Wave and won awards at the Venice and Locarno film festivals. It was also nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1967.

The Fireman's Ball

A 1967 Czechoslovak-Italian co-production, this was Forman's first color film. It is one of the best–known movies of Czechoslovak New Wave. On the face of it a naturalistic representation of an ill-fated social event in a provincial town, the film has been seen by both movie scholars and the then-authorities in Czechoslovakia as a biting satire on East European Communism, which resulted in it being banned for many years in Forman's home country. The Czech term zhasnout (to switch lights off), associated with petty theft in the film, was used to describe the large-scale asset stripping that occurred in the country during the 1990s.

It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film.

Taking Off

The first movie Forman made in the United States, Taking Off won the Grand Prix at the 1971 Cannes Film Festival. The film starred Lynn Carlin and Buck Henry, and also featured Linnea Heacock as Jeannie. The film was critically panned and left Forman struggling to find work. Forman later said that it did so poorly he ended up owing the studio $500.

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest Despite the failure of Taking Off, producers Michael Douglas and Saul Zaentz hired him to direct the adaptation of Ken Kesey's cult novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Forman later said they hired him because he was in their price range. Starring Jack Nicholson and Louise Fletcher, the adaptation was a critical and commercial success. The film won Oscars in the five most important categories: Best Director, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Picture and Best Adapted Screenplay, one of only three films in history to do so, along with It Happened One Night and The Silence of the Lambs, and firmly established Forman's reputation. Hair

The success of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest allowed Forman to direct the long-planned film Hair (a rock musical) in 1979, based on the Broadway musical by James Rado, Gerome Ragni, and Galt MacDermot. The film starred Treat Williams, John Savage and Beverly D'Angelo. The film was disowned by the original writers of the musical and although it received positive reviews did not do well financially.

Amadeus Forman's next important achievement was the adaption of Peter Shaffer's Amadeus in 1984—retelling the story of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Antonio Salieri. The internationally acclaimed film starred Tom Hulce, Elizabeth Berridge and F. Murray Abraham. The movie won eight Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor (Abraham). Valmont

His adaptation of Pierre Choderlos de Laclos's novel Les Liaisons dangereuses, it had its premiere on November 17, 1989. Another film adaptation by Stephen Frears from the same source material had been released the previous year and overshadowed Forman's adaptation. The film starred Colin Firth, Meg Tillyand Annette Bening.

The People vs. Larry Flynt

The 1996 biographical film of pornographic publisher Larry Flynt brought Forman another Oscar nomination. The film starred Woody Harrelson, Courtney Love and Edward Norton and although critically acclaimed only made $20 million at the box office.

Man on the Moon The biography of famous actor and avant-garde comic Andy Kaufman (Jim Carrey, who won a Golden Globefor his performance) premiered on December 22, 1999. The film also starred Danny DeVito, Courtney Loveand Paul Giamatti. Several actors from One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest were in this movie as well including DeVito. Goya's Ghosts

This free biography of Spanish painter Francisco Goya (an American-Spanish co-production) premiered on November 8, 2006. The film starred Natalie Portman, Javier Bardem, Stellan Skarsgård and Randy Quaid. Again it struggled at the box office.

Unfinished projects

In the late 1950s Forman and Josef Škvorecký started adapting Škvorecký’s short story Eine kleine Jazzmusik for the screen. The script, named Kapela to vyhrála (The Band Won It), tells the story of a student jazz band during the Nazi Occupation of Czechoslovakia. The script was submitted to Barrandov Film Studios. The studio required changes and both artists continued to rewrite the script. Right before the film started shooting, the whole project was completely scrapped, most probably due to intervention from people at the top of the political scene, as Škvorecký had just published his novel The Cowards, which was strongly criticized by communist politicians. The story Eine kleine Jazzmusik was dramatized as a TV film in the 1990s. In the spring and summer of 1968 Škvorecký and Forman cooperated again by jointly writing a script synopsis to make a film version of The Cowards. After Škvorecký fled the Warsaw Pact invasion the synopsis was translated into English, but no film was made.

In the early 1990s Forman co-wrote a screenplay with Adam Davidson. The screenplay, titled Hell Camp, was about an American-Japanese love affair in the world of sumo wrestlers. The picture was funded by TriStar Pictures and cancelled just four days before shooting because of the disapproval of the Japan Sumo Association, while Forman refused to make the changes requested by the association.

In the early 2000s Forman developed a film project to be titled Ember, adapted by Jean-Claude Carrière from Hungarian novelist Sándor Márai’s novel. The film was about two men in the former Austria-Hungary Empire from different social backgrounds who become friends in military school and meet again 41 years later. Forman cast Sean Connery and Klaus Maria Brandauer as well as Winona Ryder. Several months before shooting Sean Connery and the Italian producer had a disagreement and Connery withdrew from the project. Forman was so convinced that Sean Connery fit the role that he didn’t want to shoot the film without him and cancelled the project a few days before the shooting was due to start.

In the late 2000s the screenplay for Ghost of Munich was written by Forman, Jean-Claude Carriere, and Vaclav Havel (the former Czech president and writer, who had studied at school with Forman), inspired by the novel by the French novelist Georges-Marc Benamou (fr). The story takes a closer look at the events that surrounded the Munich Agreement. The role of the French Prime Minister was supposed to have been played by the French actor Mathieu Amalric with his older self played by Gérard Depardieu. However, the production company Pathé was not able to fund the project.

Miloš Forman Cinema in Čáslav

In Forman's hometown there is a cinema bearing his name - Kino Miloše Formana (Cinema of Miloš Forman). It is not directly connected with him, but as a prominent native he has left his mark on this specific site.

The cinema belongs to type of small town cinemas, it has seventeen rows and a total of 199 seats, including 8 double seats for couples. The doubles are still not quite common in such small cinemas. Between 2011 and 2013 the cinema was gradually renovated. In particular, there was a change of seats, floors and new modern air-conditioning was introduced. There was also a new possibility of screening in 3D. The investment was around three million Czech crowns (120.000 USD) to that date.

Theatre work

• Laterna magika (1958, writer)
• Laterna magika II (1960, writer)
• The Little Black Book' (1972, director)
• A Walk Worthwhile' (2007, director)

Awards, nominations and honours

Academy Awards

• 1975: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (won)
• 1984: Amadeus (won)
• 1996: The People vs. Larry Flynt (nomination)

Golden Globe

• 1975: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (won)
• 1984: Amadeus (won)
• 1981: Ragtime (nomination)
• 1996: The People vs. Larry Flynt (won)

Cannes

• 1971: Taking Off (won Grand Prize of the Jury)
• 1968: The Fireman's Ball (nomination)

Berlinale

• 1999: Man on the Moon (won)
• 1997: The People vs. Larry Flynt (won)

BAFTA

• 1975: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (won)
• 1984: Amadeus (nomination)
• 1971: Taking Off (nomination – Best Film)
• 1971: Taking Off (nomination – Best Screenplay)

César Award

• 1984: Amadeus (won)
• 1975: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (nomination)
• 1979: Hair (nomination)
• 1989: Valmont (nomination)

David di Donatello

• 1975: One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (won)
• 1984: Amadeus (won – Best Film)
• 1984: Amadeus (won – Best Screenplay)
• 1979: Hair (won)

The state prize of Klement Gottwald

• 1965: Loves of a Blonde (won)

Czech Lion

• 1998: Contribution to Czech cinema (won)

List of Greatest Czechs

• Největší Čech: # 30 place
• 1995: Medal of Merit

Doctor of Humane Letters

• 2015: Columbia University

The 5th Hanno R. Ellenbogen Citizenship Award in 2006, presented by the Prague Society and Global Panel Foundation