Name	American Express Company
Logo
Type	Public
Traded as	Dow Jones ComponentS&P; 500 Component
Predecessor	Livingston, Fargo & CompanyWells, Butterfield & CompanyWells & Company
Industry	Banking, Financial services
Foundation	Albany, New York, U.S. (1850)
Location	Three World Financial Center,New York City, New York, U.S.
Key people	Kenneth Chenault(Chairman & CEO)
Area served	Worldwide
Products	Charge card, credit cards, traveler's cheque
Services	Finance, insurance, travel
Revenue	US$ 25.612 billion (2010)
Operating income	US$ 5.964 billion (2010)
Net income	US$ 4.057 billion (2010)
Assets	US$ 147.042 billion (2010)
Equity	US$ 16.203 billion (2010)
Num employees	61,000 (2010)
Homepage	}}

American Express Company () or AmEx, is an American multinational financial services corporation headquartered in Three World Financial Center, Manhattan, New York City, New York, United States. Founded in 1850, it is one of the 30 components of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The company is best known for its credit card, charge card, and traveler's cheque businesses. Amex cards account for approximately 24% of the total dollar volume of credit card transactions in the US, the highest of any card issuer.

''BusinessWeek'' and Interbrand ranked American Express as the 22nd most valuable brand in the world, estimating the brand to be worth US$14.97 billion. ''Fortune'' listed Amex as one of the top 20 Most Admired Companies in the World.

The company's mascot, adopted in 1958, is a Roman gladiator or Centurion whose image appears on the company's travelers' cheques and charge cards.

Early history

thumb|right|285px|American Express Co. shipping receipt, New York City to [[St. Louis, Missouri|St. Louis, MO (August 6, 1853)]]American Express was started as an express mail business in Albany, New York, in 1850. It was founded as a joint stock corporation by the merger of the express companies owned by Henry Wells (Wells & Company), William Fargo (Livingston, Fargo & Company), and John Warren Butterfield (Wells, Butterfield & Company, the successor earlier in 1850 of Butterfield, Wasson & Company). The same founders also started Wells Fargo & Co. in 1852 when Butterfield and other directors objected to the proposal that American Express extend its operations to California.

American Express first established its headquarters in a building at the intersection of Jay Street and Hudson Street in what was later called the TriBeCa section of Manhattan. For years it enjoyed a virtual monopoly on the movement of express shipments (goods, securities, currency, etc.) throughout New York State. In 1874, American Express moved its headquarters to 65 Broadway in what was becoming the Financial District of Manhattan, a location it was to retain through two buildings.

American Express buildings

In 1854, the American Express Co. purchased a lot on Vesey Street in New York City as the site for its stables. The company's first New York headquarters were in an impressive marble Italianate palazzo at 55–61 Hudson Street between Thomas Street and Jay Street (1857–58, John Warren Ritch), which had a busy freight depot on the ground story with a spur line from the Hudson River Railroad. A stable was constructed nearby at 4–8 Hubert Street, between Hudson Street and Collister Street (1866–67, Ritch & Griffiths), five blocks north of the Hudson Street building.

The company prospered sufficiently that headquarters were moved in 1874 from the wholesale shipping district to the budding Financial District, and into rented offices in two five-story brownstone commercial buildings at 63 and 65 Broadway, between Exchange Alley and Rector Street, and between Broadway and Trinity Place that were owned by the Harmony family.

In 1880, American Express built a new warehouse behind the Broadway Building at 46 Trinity Place, between Exchange Alley and Rector Street. The designer is unknown, but it has a façade of brick arches that are redolent of pre-skyscraper New York. American Express has long been out of this building, but it still bears a terracotta seal with the American Express Eagle. In 1890–91 the company constructed a new ten-story building by Edward H. Kendall on the site of its former headquarters on Hudson Street.

By 1903, the company had assets of some $28 million, second only to the National City Bank of New York among financial institutions in the city. To reflect this, the company purchased the Broadway buildings and site.

At the end of the Wells-Fargo reign in 1914, an aggressive new president, George Chadbourne Taylor (1868–1923), who had worked his way up through the company over the previous thirty years, decided to build a new headquarters. The old buildings, dubbed by the New York Times as "among the ancient landmarks" of lower Broadway, were inadequate for such a rapidly expanding concern. In March 1914, Renwick, Aspinwall & Tucker filed for the construction of a 32-story concrete-and steel-framed office tower in which all of the company's operations, then in four separate buildings, were to be consolidated. The building proposal of 1914 was abandoned, probably due to the war in Europe, but was resurrected two years later in a reduced form, at an estimated cost of $1 million.

The 21-story (plus basement), neo-classical, American Express Co. Building, was constructed in 1916–17 to the design of James L. Aspinwall, of the firm of Renwick, Aspinwall & Tucker, the successor to the architectural practice of the eminent James Renwick, Jr.. The building consolidated the two lots of the former buildings with a single address: 65 Broadway. This building was part of the "Express Row" section of lower Broadway at the time. The concrete-and-steel-framed building has an H-shaped plan with tall slender wings arranged around central light courts, a type of plan employed from the 1880s through the 1910s to provide offices with maximum light and air. Faced in white brick and terra cotta above a granite base, both facades employ the tripartite composition of base-shaft-capital then popular for the articulation of skyscrapers, with a colonnaded base and upper portion. The famous American Express Eagle adorns the building twice: there is an asymmetric eagle on the lower arch, while a symmetric eagle adorns the arch atop the building. The Broadway entrance features a double-story Corinthian colonnade with large arched windows. The building completed the continuous masonry wall of its block-front poda nae and assisted in transforming Broadway into the "canyon" of neo-classical masonry office towers familiar to this day

American Express sold this building in 1975, but retained travel services here. The building was also the headquarters over the years of other prominent firms, including investment bankers J.& W. Seligman & Co. (1940–74), the American Bureau of Shipping, a maritime concern (1977–86), and currently J.J. Kenny, and Standard & Poor's, who has renamed the building for itself

Nationwide expansion

American Express extended its reach nationwide by arranging affiliations with other express companies (including Wells Fargo – the replacement for the two former companies that merged to form American Express), railroads, and steamship companies.

Financial services

In 1882, American Express started its expansion in the area of financial services by launching a money order business to compete with the United States Post Office's money orders.

Sometime between 1888 and 1890, J. C. Fargo took a trip to Europe and returned frustrated and infuriated. Despite the fact that he was president of American Express and that he carried with him traditional letters of credit, he found it difficult to obtain cash anywhere except in major cities. Fargo went to Marcellus Flemming Berry and asked him to create a better solution than the traditional letter of credit. Berry introduced the American Express Traveler's Cheque which was launched in 1891 in denominations of $10, $20, $50, and $100.

Traveler's cheques established American Express as a truly international company. In 1914, at the outbreak of World War I, American Express offices in Europe were among the few companies to honor the letters of credit (issued by various banks) held by Americans in Europe, despite other financial institutions having refused to assist these stranded travelers.

Loss of railroad express business

American Express became one of the monopolies that President Theodore Roosevelt had the Interstate Commerce Commission investigate during his administration. The interest of the ICC was drawn to its strict control of the railroad express business. However, the solution did not come immediately to hand. The solution to this problem came as a coincidence to other problems during World War I.

During the winter of 1917, the US suffered a severe coal shortage and on December 26 President Woodrow Wilson commandeered the railroads on behalf of the US government to move US troops, their supplies, and coal. Treasury Secretary William Gibbs McAdoo was assigned the task of consolidating the railway lines for the war effort. All contracts between express companies and railroads were nullified and McAdoo proposed that all existing express companies be consolidated into a single company to serve the country's needs. This ended American Express's express business, and removed them from the ICC’s interest. The result was that a new company called the American Railway Express Agency formed in July 1918. The new entity took custody of all the pooled equipment and property of existing express companies (the largest share of which, 40%, came from American Express, who had owned the rights to the express business over of railroad lines, and had 10,000 offices, with over 30,000 employees).

Recent history

Current CEO Kenneth Chenault took over leadership of American Express in 2001 from Harvey Golub, CEO from 1993 to 2001. Prior to that, the company was headed by James D. Robinson III from 1977 to 1993.

Charge card services

American Express executives discussed the possibility of launching a travel charge card as early as 1946, but it was not until Diners Club launched their card in March 1950 that American Express began to seriously consider the possibility. At the end of 1957, American Express CEO Ralph Reed decided to get into the card business, and by the launch date of October 1, 1958 public interest had become so significant that they issued 250,000 cards prior to the official launch date. The card was launched with an annual fee of $6, $1 higher than Diners Club, to be seen as a premium product. The first cards were paper, with the account number and cardmember's name typed. It was not until 1959 that American Express began issuing embossed ISO/IEC 7810 plastic cards, an industry first.

In 1966, American Express introduced the Gold Card and in 1984 the Platinum Card, clearly defining different market segments within its own business, a practice that has proliferated across a broad array of industries. The Platinum Card was billed as super-exclusive and had a $250 annual fee (it is currently $450). It was offered by invitation only to American Express customers with at least 2 years of tenure, significant spending, and excellent payment history; it is now open to applications on request.

In 1987, American Express introduced the Optima card, their first credit card product. Previously, all American Express cards had to be paid in full each month, but Optima allowed customers to carry a balance (the charge cards also now allow extended payment options on qualifying charges based on credit availability). Although American Express no longer accepts applications for the Optima brand of cards, since July 13, 2009, Optima cards are still listed on the American Express website, as a reference to existing members only. According to American Express, Optima accounts were not converted or closed. However, Blue from American Express has prevailed as the replacement for the original Optima style of credit card. Blue includes multiple benefits free of charge, unlike Optima, including the Membership Rewards program.

In April 1992, American Express spun off its subsidiary, First Data Corp., in an IPO. Then, in October 1996, the company distributed the remaining majority of its holdings in First Data Corp., reducing its ownership to less than 5%.

In 1994, the Optima True Grace card was introduced. The card was unique in that it offered a grace period on all purchases whether a balance was carried on the card or not (as opposed to traditional revolving credit cards which charge interest on new purchases if so much as $1 was carried over). The card was discontinued a few years later; the now discontinued One from American Express card offered a similar feature called "Interest Protection....."

"Boston Fee Party"

From early 1980s until the early 1990s, American Express was known for cutting its merchant fees (also known as a "discount rate") to merchants and restaurants if they accepted only American Express and no other credit or charge cards. This prompted competitors such as Visa and MasterCard to cry foul for a while as the tactics "locked" restaurants into American Express.

However, in 1991, several restaurants in Boston started accepting and encouraging the use of Visa and MasterCard because of their far lower fees as compared to American Express' fees at the time (which were about 4% for each transaction versus around 1.2% at the time for Visa and MasterCard). A few even stopped accepting American Express credit and charge cards. The revolt, known as the "Boston Fee Party" in reference to the Boston Tea Party, quickly spread nationwide to over 250 restaurants across the United States, including restaurants in other cities such as New York City, Chicago, and Los Angeles. In response, American Express decided to reduce its discount rate gradually to compete more effectively and add new merchants to its network such as supermarkets and drugstores. Many elements of the exclusive acceptance program were also phased out so American Express could effectively encourage businesses to add American Express cards to their existing list of payment options.

Currently, American Express' average US merchant rate is about 2.89%, while the average Discover, Mastercard, and Visa U.S. merchant rate is about 2% (Visa/MasterCard signature debit cards are at 1.7%.) Some merchant sectors, such as quick-service restaurants including McDonald's, have special reduced rates to accommodate business needs and profit margins.

Cable TV

American Express formed a joint venture with Warner Communications in 1979 called Warner-Amex Satellite Entertainment, which created MTV, Nickelodeon, and The Movie Channel. The partnership only lasted until 1984. The properties were sold to Viacom soon after.

Conversion to bank holding company

On November 10, 2008, during the financial crisis of 2008, the company won Federal Reserve System approval to convert to a bank holding company, making it eligible for government help under the Troubled Asset Relief Program. At that time, American Express had total consolidated assets of about $127 billion. In June 2009, $3.39 billion in TARP funds were repaid plus $74.4 million in dividend payments, and in July 2009 they ended their obligations under TARP by buying back $340 million in Treasury warrants.

Controversy in the UK

In November 2010 the UK division of American Express was cautioned by the Office of Fair Trading for the use of controversial 'charging orders' against those in debt. The regulator said that the company was one of four companies who were encouraging customers to turn their unsecured credit card debts into a form of secured debt.

Loyalty acquisition

In March 2011, American Express completed a $685m purchase of Loyalty Partner, which operates the Payback loyalty program in Germany and Poland, and the i-Mint loyalty program in India.

Business model

Typical credit card business model

When a consumer makes a purchase using a credit or charge card, a small portion of the price is paid as a fee (known as the merchant discount), with the merchant keeping the remainder. There are typically three parties who split this fee amongst themselves: # Acquiring bank: the bank which processes credit card transactions for a merchant, including crediting the merchant's account for the value charged to a credit card less all fees. # Issuing bank: the bank which issues the consumer's credit card. This is the bank a consumer is responsible for repaying after making a credit card purchase. The issuer's share of the merchant discount is known as the interchange fee. # Network: the link between acquiring banks and issuing banks. These banks have relationships with a network, rather than with each other, for fulfilling card purchases. This allows a card issued by a community bank in Peru to be used at a shop in Sri Lanka, for instance, without requiring the banks to have a direct relationship with each other. The two largest networks in the world are Visa and MasterCard.

The average merchant discount in the United States is 1.9%. Of this, approximately 0.1% goes to the acquirer, 1.7% to the issuer, and 0.09% to the network.

Most Prime and Superprime card issuers use the majority of their interchange revenue to fund loyalty programs like frequent flyer points and cash back, and hence their profit from card spending is small relative to the interest they earn from card lending.

How American Express differs

American Express typically plays the role of all three parties above, keeping the entire merchant discount. In recent years Amex has begun authorizing other banks to either acquire or issue on Amex's behalf, primarily in countries where Amex would otherwise have little or no presence.

Amex also has historically charged a higher merchant discount than Visa or MasterCard. The size of the premium can differ significantly: in the US, Amex charges 66 basis points more (2.56% vs 1.9%) than rivals Visa and MasterCard, while in Australia Amex charges more than twice as much as Visa or MasterCard due to Australian interchange regulations.

Amex uses this higher discount revenue to invest in rewards programs that provide a higher payout than competing programs. These more substantial rewards programs, in addition to a premium brand and a reputation for superior customer service, allows Amex to attract a disproportionate share of affluent consumers. Amex then uses its strength with affluent consumers to justify charging a higher merchant discount rate, implying that if a merchant does not accept Amex cards he will lose affluent customers. This business model creates a self-reinforcing loop.

Due to what Amex calls its "spend-centric strategy", card spending and fees are responsible for 70% of Amex's card profit, vs. 10–40% for other issuers. Amex also tends to make more money from annual fees than other issuers do.

One tension in Amex's business model is acceptance, a volume vs. margin trade-off. Because Amex charges a higher merchant discount fee, it is not as widely accepted as Visa or MasterCard. Amex's business model depends on having a higher discount fee, however, making it difficult to lower it. The company has to strike a balance, keeping its fee low enough to attract sufficient merchants, but high enough to fund rich rewards and drive its business model. In countries where Amex charges a small premium, like the US, it has near-parity acceptance, but its card rewards are not significantly more substantial than those of its competitors. In countries where it charges a large premium, its cards often have a much higher rewards payout than competing cards.

Many banks fund their lending, both card and otherwise, through deposits. Without deposits, however, Amex has historically funded its lending through outstanding travelers cheques (which function like non-interest-bearing deposits), the wholesale funding markets, and securitization. As travelers cheques have declined in popularity since the rise of ATMs, Amex has begun seeking traditional deposits through online high-yield savings accounts. The freeze in wholesale funding markets and securitization during the financial crisis of 2007–2010 caused Amex to accelerate these deposit-raising efforts, and also caused them to decrease growth in lending.

Due to its focus on affluent customers, Amex has historically had lower levels of credit losses than other issuers. The gap has almost disappeared for Q3'08 to Q1'09, however, as card issuers of all types experienced heightened credit losses.

Card products

Consumer cards

American Express is best known for its iconic Green, Gold, and Platinum charge cards, and offers credit cards of similar color levels in most countries.

In 1999, American Express introduced the Centurion Card, often referred to as the "black card," which caters to an even more affluent and elite customer segment. The card was initially only available to select users of the Platinum card. The annual fee for the card is $2,500 (up from $1,000 at introduction) with an additional one-time initiation fee of $5,000. In addition to a variety of exclusive benefits, the card itself is made of titanium. American Express created the card line amid rumors and urban legends in the 1980s that it produced an ultra-exclusive black card for elite users who could purchase anything with it.

American Express cards range between no annual fee (for Blue and many other consumer and business cards) and a $450 annual fee (for the Platinum card). Annual fees for the Green card start at $95 (first year free), while Gold card annual fees start at $125.

American Express has several co-branded credit cards, with most falling into one of two categories:

Airlines and hotels: e.g. Delta Air Lines, Virgin Atlantic, British Airways, Singapore Airlines, Qantas, JetBlue Airways, Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Hilton Hotels, Air France and Alitalia among others.

Retailers: e.g. Costco, David Jones, Holt Renfrew, Harrods, Macys, Bloomingdales and others

Their card aimed at young adults is called Blue from American Express. A television media campaign for Blue adopted the 1979 UK Synthpop hit "Cars" by Gary Numan as its theme song. Based on a successful product for the European market, Blue had no annual fee, a rewards program, and a multi-functional onboard smart chip. A cashback version, "Blue Cash", quickly followed. Amex also targeted young adults with City Reward Cards that earn INSIDE Rewards points to eat, drink, and play at New York, Chicago and LA hot spots. American Express began phasing out the INSIDE cards in mid-2008, with no new applications being taken as of July 2008.

In 2005, American Express introduced Clear, advertised as the first credit card with no fees of any kind. Also in 2005, American Express introduced One, a credit card with a "Savings Accelerator Plan" that contributes 1% of eligible purchases into an High-Yield Savings Account insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. Other cards introduced in 2005 included "The Knot" and "The Nest" Credit Cards from American Express, co-branded cards developed with the wedding planning website theknot.com.

In 2006, the UK division of American Express joined the Product Red coalition and began to issue a Red Card. With each card member purchase the company contributes to good causes through The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria to help African women and children suffering from HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases.

In 2009, American Express introduced the ZYNC charge card. White in color, this card was created for people in their 20s and 30s. The card is currently in open beta testing and anyone can apply for it.

ExpressPay

In 2005, American Express introduced ExpressPay, similar to MasterCard PayPass and Visa payWave. It is a contactless payment system based on wireless RFID, where transactions are completed by holding the credit card near a receiver at which point the debt is immediately added to the account. The card is not swiped and no PIN is entered. Many U.S. merchant and restaurant partners now offer ExpressPay, including Starbuck's, Meijer, CVS/Pharmacy, Best Buy, Chevron Corporation, Noah's Bagels, and some McDonald's locations. Office Depot has implemented ExpressPay in all 1200 of its stores.

Small business services (also known as American Express OPEN)

American Express offers various types of charge cards for small businesses to manage their expenses, and the company is also the largest provider of corporate cards.

In late 2007, the company announced the new Plum Card as the latest addition to their card line for small business owners. The card provides a 1.5% early pay discount or up to two months to defer payment on purchases. The 1.5% discount is available for billing periods where the cardmember spends at least $5,000. The first 10,000 cards were issued to members on December 16, 2007.

In 2008, American Express made a decision to close all Business Line of Credit accounts. This decision was reached in tandem with the Federal Reserve's approval of American Express's request to become a Commercial Bank.

Commercial cards and services

American Express also offers a comprehensive range of cards designed to support mid-size and large business manage their travel and day-to-day operational expenses. The core product, the American Express Corporate Card is offered in over 40 countries, and a number of complementary products for specific types of spend are offered for special needs. Examples of these products include the Corporate Meeting Card, the Corporate Purchasing Card, and the Business Travel Account. Commercial Cards differ from Business Cards as they enable company liability (business cards are issued as extensions of credit to the company's owner). In addition, Commercial Cards offer a comprehensive suite of data and reporting solutions that help clients gain visibility and control over employee spend.

As part of supporting Corporate clients, American Express offers a number of online solutions delivered through the American Express @ Work website. From American Express @ Work, clients have access to program management capabilities, online statements, reporting and data integration products. Information @ Work, a reporting tool targeted at mid-size companies to give them quick and easy access to their employees' spend data; Customized Reporting is provided to larger clients who require more advanced analytics and data consolidation capabilities. American Express also provides data files to clients to power expense reporting and reconciliation tools.

In 2008, American Express acquired the Corporate Payment Services business of GE, which primarily focused on providing Purchasing Card solutions for large global clients. As part of the $1b+ transaction, American Express also added a new product, called V-Payment, to its product portfolio. V-Payment is unique in that it enables a tightly controlled, single-use card number for increased control.

In December 2010, the Commercial Card division launched American Express Business4Business – a network of business-centric products and services. Initially launched with telecommunications solutions, the organization also launched commercial insurance and foreign exchange payment products in March 2011.

Non-proprietary cards

In December 2000, American Express agreed to acquire the credit card portfolio of Bank of Hawaii, then a division of Pacific Century Financial Corp. In January 2006, American Express sold its Bank of Hawaii card portfolio to Bank of America (MBNA). Bank of America will issue Visa and American Express cards under the Bank of Hawaii name.

Until 2004, Visa and MasterCard rules prohibited issuers of their cards from issuing American Express cards in the United States. This meant, as a practical matter, that U.S. banks could not issue American Express cards. These rules were struck down as a result of antitrust litigation brought by the U.S. Department of Justice, and are no longer in effect. In January 2004, American Express reached a deal to have its cards issued by a U.S. bank, MBNA America. Initially decried by MasterCard executives as nothing but an "experiment", these cards were released in October 2004. Some said that the relationship was going to be threatened by MBNA's merger with Bank of America, a major Visa issuer and original developer of Visa. However, an agreement was reached between American Express and Bank of America on December 21, 2005. Under the terms of the agreement, Bank of America will own the customer loans and American Express will process the transactions. Also, American Express will dismiss Bank of America from its antitrust litigation against Visa, MasterCard, and a number of U.S. banks. Finally, both Bank of America and American Express also said an existing card-issuing partnership between MBNA and American Express will continue after the Bank of America-MBNA merger. The first card from the partnership, the no-annual-fee Bank of America Rewards American Express card, was released on June 30, 2006.

Since then, Citibank, GE Money, and USAA have also started issuing American Express cards. Citibank currently issues several American Express cards including an American Airlines AAdvantage co-branded card. In early 2006 Amex issued Dillard's American Express card in joint cooperation with GE Money, however, in Mar 2008 GE sold its card unit to Amex for $1.1bn in cash only deal. HSBC Bank USA is currently testing both HSBC-branded and Neiman Marcus co-branded American Express rewards credit cards, with a full rollout scheduled for late 2007 or early 2008. Also, UBS launched its Resource Card program for US Wealth Management clients issuing Visa Signature credit cards and American Express charge cards linked to their customers accounts and employing a single rewards program for the two cards. Fidelity operates a similar program, issuing both American Express and Visa Signature cards through FIA Card Services.

Non-card products

Traveler's cheques

Amex is the largest provider of traveler's cheques in the world.

In 2005, American Express released the American Express Travelers Cheque Card, a stored-value card that serves the same purposes as a traveler's cheque, but can be used in stores like a credit card. The card has since been discontinued as of October 31, 2007, due to "changing market conditions". All cardholders were issued refund checks for the remaining balances.

Shearson/American Express

During the 1980s, American Express embarked on its dream to become a financial services supercompany. In mid-1981 it purchased Sanford I. Weill's Shearson Loeb Rhoades, the second largest securities firm in the United States to form Shearson/American Express. Shearson Loeb Rhoades, itself was the culmination of several mergers in the 1970s as Weill's Hayden, Stone & Co. merged with Shearson, Hammill & Co. in 1974 to form Shearson Hayden Stone. Shearson Hayden Stone then merged with Loeb, Rhoades, Hornblower & Co. (formerly Loeb, Rhoades & Co. to form Shearson Loeb Rhoades in 1979. With capital totalling $250 million at the time of its acquisition, Shearson Loeb Rhoades trailed only Merrill Lynch as the securities brokerage industry's largest firm. After its acquisition by American Express, the firm was renamed Shearson/American Express.

In 1984 Shearson/American Express purchased the 90-year old Investors Diversified Services, bringing with it a fleet of financial advisors and investment products. Also in 1984, American Express acquired the investment banking and trading firm, Lehman Brothers Kuhn Loeb, and added it to the Shearson family, creating Shearson Lehman/American Express. In 1988, the Firm acquired E. F. Hutton & Co., forming Shearson Lehman Hutton until 1990, when the Firm's name became Shearson Lehman Brothers. When Harvey Golub took the reins in 1993 he negotiated the sale of Shearson's retail brokerage and asset management business to Primerica and in following year, spun off of the remaining investment banking and institutional businesses as Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.

The following is an illustration of American Express' consolidation of the brokerage and investment banking industries in the 1980s and early 1990s through the creation of Shearson Lehman Brothers, later Shearson Lehman Hutton (this is not a comprehensive list):

|2=Shearson, Hammill & Co.(est. 1902)

}}

|label2=Loeb, Rhoades, Hornblower & Co.(merged 1978) |2= |label2=Hornblower, Weeks, Noyes & Trask(merged 1953–1977) |2= }}

}} }}

|label2=Lehman Brothers Kuhn Loeb(merged 1977) |2= }} |label2= |2=E. F. Hutton & Co.(est. 1904) }} }}}}

Financial Advisors

On September 30, 2005, American Express spun off its American Express Financial Advisors unit as a publicly traded company, Ameriprise Financial, Inc.. Due to this, American Express revenues for 2005 are down around $5 billion, however, like-for-like they are up 10.5% in 2005. Also, on September 30, 2005, RSM McGladrey acquired American Express Tax & Business Services (TBS).

On September 18, 2007, it was announced that Standard Chartered Bank agreed to acquire American Express Bank Ltd, a commercial bank, from American Express Co, for an estimated $1.1 billion, through a friendly divestiture process. The transaction is currently subject to regulatory approvals. Lehman Brothers had advised American Express in this deal.

Travel

American Express established a Travel Division in 1915 that tied together all of the earlier efforts at making travel easier, and soon established its first travel agencies. In the 1930s, the Travel Division had grown widely. Albert K. Dawson was instrumental in expanding business operations overseas, even investing in tourist relations with the Soviet Union. Dawson during World War I had been a photographer and film correspondent with the German army. Today the focus of The Travel Division is on business customers and business travel.

Publishing

Amex publishes the Travel + Leisure, Food & Wine, Executive Travel, and Departures magazines.

Advertising

In 1975, David Ogilvy of Ogilvy & Mather developed the highly successful Don't Leave Home Without Them ad campaign for American Express Traveler's Cheques, featuring Oscar-award-winning actor Karl Malden. Karl Malden served as the public face of American Express Travelers Cheques for 25 years. In the UK the spokesman was instead the television personality Alan Whicker.

After Karl Malden's departure and as the card was promoted over the traveller's cheques, American Express continued to use celebrities, such as Mel Blanc and ballerina Cynthia Gregory. A typical ad for the American Express Card began with a celebrity asking viewers: "Do you know me?" Although he/she gave hints to his/her identity, the star's name was never mentioned except as imprinted on an American Express Card, after which announcer Peter Thomas told viewers how to apply for it. Each ad concluded with the celebrity reminding viewers: "Don't Leave Home Without It." The "Don't Leave Home Without It" slogan was revived in 2005 for the prepaid American Express Travelers Cheque Card.

These slogans have been parodied numerous times:

The long-running PBS children's TV series ''Sesame Street'' parodied the "Do you know me?/Don't Leave Home Without It" ad campaigns with three skits involving a Muppet character holding a Grown-Up Friend's hand while crossing the street. One skit featured Forgetful Jones (performed by Richard Hunt) with Olivia (Alaina Reed Hall) as his Grown-Up Friend, a second featured Bert and Ernie (Frank Oz and Jim Henson respectively) with Gordon (Roscoe Orman) as their Grown-Up Friend, and the third featured Big Bird (Caroll Spinney) with Bob (Bob McGrath) as his Grown-Up Friend. All three skits ended with their names being embossed at the bottom of a card looking like an American Express card that had a big human left hand in the middle with the words "Grown-Up Friend's Hand" above it, and a voiceover saying "A Grown-Up Friend's Hand. Don't cross the street without it."

Another parody was seen on an episode of the CBS game show ''Press Your Luck'', when the animated "Whammy Character" would give the "Do you know me?" tag line, followed by the display of an AmEx card-parody, which then had "WHAMMY" typed in on the bottom line of the card.

In a campaign speech during the 1984 Election, President Ronald Reagan said "If the big spenders get their way, they'll charge everything to your taxpayer's express card, and believe me, they never leave home without it."

On the 1997 film ''Hercules'' during the song "Zero to Hero", the credit card is "Grecian Express".

The 1989 movie ''Major League'' also parodied the campaign. In one scene, in which every player is dressed in a tuxedo, the Cleveland Indians tell viewers of the film why every player carries the American Express Card with much of the explanation done one line at a time by players Jake Taylor (Tom Berenger), Eddie Harris (Chelcie Ross), Rick "Wild Thing" Vaughn (Charlie Sheen), Pedro Cerrano (Dennis Haysbert), and Roger Dorn (Corbin Bernsen), and Manager Lou Brown (James Gammon). The scene ends with Willie "Mays" Hayes (a tuxedo-clad Wesley Snipes) sliding into home plate in front of the rest of the team, holding up his card and saying to the viewers: "The American Express Card. Don't steal home without it."

In ''Batman & Robin'' Batman pulls out a Bat-Credit card and says he never leaves the cave without it.

American Express continues to use celebrities in their ads. Some notable examples include a late 1990s ad campaign with comedian Jerry Seinfeld, including the two 2004 webisodes in a series entitled "The Adventures of Seinfeld & Superman." In late 2004, American Express launched the "My life. My card." brand campaign (also by Ogilvy & Mather) featuring famous American Express cardmembers talking about their life. The ads have featured actors Kate Winslet, Robert De Niro, Ken Watanabe and Tina Fey, Duke University basketball coach Mike Krzyzewski, fashion designer Collette Dinnigan, comedian and talk show hostess Ellen DeGeneres, golfer Tiger Woods, professional snowboarder Shaun White, tennis pros Venus Williams and Andy Roddick, Real Madrid manager José Mourinho, and film directors Martin Scorsese, Wes Anderson, M. Night Shyamalan and most recently singer Beyoncé Knowles. In 2007, a two-minute black-and-white ad entitled "Animals" starring Ellen DeGeneres won the Emmy Award for Outstanding Commercial.

Many American Express credit card ads feature a sample American Express Card with the name "C F Frost" on the front. This is not a fabricated name, as Charles F. Frost was an advertising executive from Ogilvy & Mather.

In addition, American Express was one of the earliest users of cause marketing, to great success. A 1983 promotion advertised that for each purchase made with an American Express Card, American Express would contribute one penny to the renovation of the Statue of Liberty. The campaign generated contributions of $1.7 million to the Statue of Liberty restoration project. What would soon capture the attention of marketing departments of major corporations was that the promotion generated approximately a 28% increase in American Express card usage by consumers. Building on its earlier promotion, American Express later conducted a four-year Charge Against Hunger program, which generated approximately $22 million for a charity addressing poverty and hunger relief. In 2006, as part of Bono's Product Red, American Express launched the American Express Red Card with campaign starred by supermodel Gisele Bündchen. The card, currently available only in the United Kingdom, makes a donation to fight AIDS with every purchase made using the card. In May 2007, American Express launched an initiative called the "membersproject" . Cardholders were invited to submit ideas for projects and American Express is funding the winning (provide clean drinking water) project $2 million.

Workplace

Offices

In April 1986 American Express moved its headquarters to the 51-story Three World Financial Center in New York City. After the events of September 11, 2001, American Express had to leave its headquarters temporarily as it was located directly opposite to the World Trade Center and was damaged during the fall of the towers. The company began gradually moving back into its rehabilitated building in 2002.

The company also has major offices in Fort Lauderdale, FL; Salt Lake City, UT; Greensboro, NC and Phoenix, AZ. It has a technology center in Weston, FL. The main data center is located in Phoenix.

AMEX Bank of Canada was founded in 1853 in Toronto, however it currently has its headquarters of 3,000 employees in Markham, Ontario (a northern suburb of Toronto), as well as an office in Hamilton, Ontario. The company began operations as a bank on July 1, 1990 following an order-in-council made by the Brian Mulroney government on November 21, 1988. This decision was not without controversy as federal banking policy at the time would not ordinarily have permitted American Express to operate as a bank. It is also a member of the Canadian Bankers Association (CBA) and is a registered member of the Canada Deposit Insurance Corporation (CDIC), a federal agency insuring deposits at all of Canada's chartered banks.

American Express has several offices in the UK, including a 9-story European Service Center, known as Amex House, in the Carlton Hill area of Brighton, England. It is a large white tower block, built in 1977 and surrounded by several other smaller offices around the city. Amex House deals with card servicing, sales, fraud and merchant servicing. The official Europe, Middle East, and Africa HQ is located in the Belgravia district of Westminster, in central London, at Belgrave House on Buckingham Palace Road, SW1; other UK offices are based in Sussex at Burgess Hill. In November 2009, Brighton and Hove City Council granted planning permission for American Express to redevelop the Amex House site. It is anticipated, in line with the Council's plan for the Edward Street Quarter, that the existing Amex House will be demolished by 2016. More information on this development is available at edwardstreet.co.uk.

The Japan, Asia-Pacific, and Australian Headquarters is co-located in Singapore, at 16 Collyer Quay, and in Sydney's King Street Wharf area, with the new state-of-the-art building receiving greenhouse status due to the environmentally friendly workspace that it provides.

The headquarters of the Latin America and Caribbean division is in Miami.

American Express also has a significant presence in India. Its two centres are located at Gurgaon, Haryana and one at Mathura Road, New Delhi. The Indian operations of American Express revolves around the back office customer services operations apart from the credit card business for the domestic Indian Economy.

Job satisfaction

For 2008, American Express was named the 62nd best company to work for in the United States by ''Fortune'', ranking it number one for bank card companies. In October 2008, Amex Canada Inc. was named one of Greater Toronto's Top Employers by Mediacorp Canada Inc., which was announced by the ''Toronto Star'' newspaper.

American Express was named one of the 100 Best Companies for Working Mothers living in the United States in 2006 and 2007 by U.S.-based ''Working Mothers'' magazine.

Management and corporate governance

Key executives include:

Kenneth Chenault: Chairman and Chief Executive Officer

Daniel T. Henry : Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer

Edward Gilligan: Vice Chairman

L. Kevin Cox: Executive Vice President – Human Resources and Quality

Ashwini Gupta: Chief Risk Officer, President – Risk, Information Management & Banking Group

John D. Hayes: Executive Vice President Global Advertising & Brand Management, and Chief Marketing Officer

Judson C. Linville: President and Chief Executive Officer – Consumer Services

Louise Parent: Executive Vice President and General Counsel

Thomas Schick: Executive Vice President – Corporate and External Affairs

Steve Squeri: Group President – Global Services

Douglas E. Buckminster: President – International Consumer and Small Business Services

William H. Glenn: President – Global Merchant Services

Toby Redshaw - Chief Information Officer

Dan Schulman - Enterprise Growth

Current members of the board of directors of American Express are:

Daniel F. Akerson: Managing Director of the Carlyle Group

Charlene Barshefsky: Former United States Trade Representative

Ursula M. Burns: President of Xerox Corporation

Kenneth I. Chenault: Chairman and CEO of American Express Co.

Peter Chernin: Former President and COO, News Corporation

Vernon E. Jordan, Jr.: Senior Managing Director with Lazard Freres & Co. LLC

Jan Leschly: CEO of Care Capital LLC

Richard C. Levin: President, Yale University

Richard A. McGinn: Former CEO of Lucent Technologies, Partner, RRE Ventures

Edward D. Miller: Former President and CEO of AXA SA

Frank P. Popoff: Former Chairman Chemical Financial Corp.

Steven S. Reinemund: Former Chairman and CEO, PepsiCo Inc.

Robert D. Walter: Chairman and CEO, Cardinal Health

Ronald A. Williams: Chairman and CEO, Aetna Inc.

Sponsorship

On June 22, 2010, it was revealed that American Express would sponsor English football (soccer) team Brighton & Hove Albion's new stadium at Falmer. Commercially, the stadium will be known as ''The American Express Community Stadium''.

See also

American Express Gold card dress of Lizzy Gardiner

History of Wells Fargo

Standard & Poors Building

Serve (payment system)

Business4Business

People

Franklin P. Buyer, Los Angeles City Council member, 1933–39, managed American Express office

References

External links

Who Accepts American Express in the UK?

American Express Business4Business

American Express facts and Benefits

Category:1850 establishments in the United States Category:Banks based in New York City Category:Banks established in 1850 Category:Berkshire Hathaway Category:Companies based in Manhattan Category:Companies established in 1850 Category:Contactless smart cards Category:Credit cards Category:Credit card issuer associations Category:Dow Jones Industrial Average Category:Financial services companies based in New York City Category:Multinational companies headquartered in the United States Category:Payment systems Category:Publicly traded companies Category:Wells Fargo

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name	Wes Anderson
birth date	May 01, 1969
birth place	Houston, Texas, United States
birth name	Wesley Wales Anderson
occupation	Director, Screenwriter, Producer, Actor
years active	1994–present
website	}}

Wesley Wales Anderson (born May 1, 1969) is an American film director, screenwriter, actor, and producer of features, short films and commercials.

He was nominated for a 2001 Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for ''The Royal Tenenbaums''. Anderson has been called an auteur, as he is involved in every aspect of his films' production. His films employ a similar aesthetic, employing a deliberate, methodical cinematography, with mostly primary colors. His soundtracks feature folk and early rock music, in particular classic British rock. Anderson's films combine dry humor with poignant portrayals of flawed characters – often a mix of the wealthy and the working class. He is also known for working with many of the same actors and crew on varying projects.

Early life

Anderson graduated from St. John's School (Texas) and then from the University of Texas at Austin with a B.A. in Philosophy.

Film career

Anderson's films feature many of the same actors, crew members, and other collaborators. For example, the Wilson brothers (Owen, Luke, and Andrew), Bill Murray, Willem Dafoe, Seymour Cassel, Anjelica Huston, Jason Schwartzman, Kumar Pallana and son Dipak Pallana, Stephen Dignan and Brian Tenenbaum (Anderson's close friends), and Eric Chase Anderson (Anderson's brother). Other frequent collaborators include writer Noah Baumbach (who co-wrote ''The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou'' and ''Fantastic Mr. Fox'', with Anderson co-producing his film ''The Squid and the Whale''), Owen Wilson (who co-wrote three of Anderson's feature films), cinematographer Robert Yeoman (A.S.C.), music supervisor Randall Poster, and composer Mark Mothersbaugh.

Anderson has acknowledged that he went to India to film his 2007 film ''The Darjeeling Limited'' partly as a tribute to the legendary Indian filmmaker Satyajit Ray, whose "films have also inspired all my other movies in different ways" (the film is dedicated to him). Jason Schwartzman reunited with Anderson for the ''The Darjeeling Limited'', acting as well as co-writing the script with Anderson and Roman Coppola. In September 2006, following the disappointing commercial and critical reception of ''The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou'', Steely Dan's Walter Becker and Donald Fagen released a tongue-in-cheek "letter of intervention" of Anderson's artistic "malaise." Proclaiming themselves to be fans of "World Cinema" and Anderson in particular, they offered Anderson their soundtrack services for his ''The Darjeeling Limited'', including lyrics for a title track.

Anderson's stop-motion animation adaptation of the Roald Dahl book ''Fantastic Mr. Fox'' was released in 2009. In 2008, Wes Anderson was hired to write the screenplay of the American adaptation of ''My Best Friend'', a French film, for producer Brian Grazer, Anderson's first draft was titled "The Rosenthaler Suite".

Filmmaker Martin Scorsese is an admirer of Anderson's, praising ''Bottle Rocket'' and ''Rushmore'' in an Esquire magazine article.

Advertising

In September 2007, Wes Anderson oversaw a series of six commercials for AT&T;: "College Kid", "Reporter", "Mom", "Architect", "Actor" and "Businessman." The campaign also includes online, print and outdoor advertising. These TV spots are part of AT&T;'s "Your Seamless World" national campaign from BBDO/New York. Each ad embodies Anderson's distinct style by focusing on a subject and having the environment around them change. Each of the six AT&T; commercials introduces us to a different AT&T; customer. As each of these people comes before the camera and talks about the different, far-reaching locales where he or she needs cell-phone service, the visuals behind the customer change dramatically to reflect the different destinations. The "Reporter" piece was subject to controversy when several Lebanese-American groups protested its airing as ignorant given the complex and sensitive nature of the Lebanese political situation. The ad portrayed photojournalists dodging bullets on a Beirut rooftop while the city was being bombed. It was subsequently pulled from rotation after the assassination of Antoine Ghanem on September 19, 2007 with AT&T; and BBDO issuing public apologies. Anderson starred in and directed an American Express "My Life, My Card" commercial, which chronicled the "filming" of an action movie starring Jason Schwartzman. Anderson acts as if he is being interviewed by someone from American Express for the ad, while walking around completing tasks on set, a scene paying homage to the movie ''Day for Night'' by François Truffaut. It was aired on television and in movie theaters in both a short and extended version, during and shortly after the theatrical release of ''The Life Aquatic''.

In 2008, Wes Anderson teamed up with Brad Pitt for a commercial for Japanese cell phones. The commercial takes inspiration from Jacques Tati's ''Les Vacances de Monsieur Hulot''. Anderson filmed Pitt in one continuous shot at a French seaside town.

Filmography

Feature films

''Bottle Rocket'' (1996)

''Rushmore'' (1998)

''The Royal Tenenbaums'' (2001)

''The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou'' (2004)

''The Darjeeling Limited'' (2007)

''Fantastic Mr. Fox'' (2009)

''Moonrise Kingdom'' (2012)

Short films

''Hotel Chevalier'' (2007)

Recurring collaborators

References

External links

Tête-à-Tête with Nic Harcourt at ''Los Angeles Times Magazine''

"Into The Deep", in-depth Anderson profile at ''The Guardian'' 12 February 2005

"Wes Anderson", brief profile by Martin Scorsese. ''Esquire''.

Interview with Wes Anderson for The Darjeeling Limited at Ioncinema.com

Wes Anderson Interview on ''The Hour'' with George Stroumboulopoulos (Video)

"Notes on Quirky" Movie: A Journal of Film Criticism, No.1, 2010

Category:1969 births Category:American film directors Category:American screenwriters Category:Living people Category:People from Austin, Texas Category:People from Houston, Texas Category:Stop motion animators Category:American expatriates in France

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birth date	November 17, 1942
birth place	Flushing, Queens, NY, U.S.
nationality	American
influences	''in alphabetical order'': Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger, Satyajit Ray
years active	1963–present
birth name	Martin Charles Scorsese
occupation	Film director, producer, actor, screenwriter
education	Cardinal Hayes High School
alma mater	New York University / Tisch
spouse	Laraine Marie Brennan (1965–ca 71; divorced)Julia Cameron (1976–77; divorced)Isabella Rossellini (1979–82; divorced)Barbara De Fina (1985–91; divorced)Helen Morris (1999–present)
parents	Charles Scorsese,Catherine Scorsese }}

Martin Charles Scorsese (; born November 17, 1942) is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. In 1990 he founded The Film Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to film preservation, and in 2007 he founded the World Cinema Foundation. He is a recipient of the AFI Life Achievement Award for his contributions to the cinema, and has won Oscars, Emmys, Golden Globes, BAFTAs, and DGA Awards.

Scorsese's body of work addresses such themes as Italian American identity, Roman Catholic concepts of guilt and redemption, machismo, modern crime and violence. Scorsese is hailed as one of the most significant and influential American filmmakers of all time, directing landmark films such as ''Mean Streets'', ''Taxi Driver'', ''Raging Bull'', and ''Goodfellas'' – all of which he collaborated on with actor and close friend Robert De Niro. He won the Academy Award for Best Director for ''The Departed'', having been nominated a previous five times.

Martin Scorsese grew up in New York City. His father, Charles Scorsese (1913–1993), and mother, Catherine Scorsese (born Cappa; 1912–97), both worked in New York's Garment District. His father was a clothes presser and an actor, and his mother was a seamstress and an actress. His father's parents emigrated from Polizzi Generosa, in the province of Palermo, Sicily, and his mother was also of Italian descent. Scorsese was raised in a devoutly Catholic environment. As a boy, he had asthma and couldn't play sports or do any activities with other kids and so his parents and his older brother would often take him to movie theaters; it was at this stage in his life that he developed passion for cinema. Enamored of historical epics in his adolescence, at least two films of the genre, ''Land of the Pharaohs'' and ''El Cid'', appear to have had a deep and lasting impact on his cinematic psyche. Scorsese also developed an admiration for neorealist cinema at this time. He recounted its influence in a documentary on Italian neorealism, and commented on how ''Bicycle Thieves'' alongside ''Paisà'', ''Rome, Open City'' inspired him and how this influenced his view or portrayal of his Sicilian genes. In his documentary, ''Il Mio Viaggio in Italia'', Scorsese noted that the Sicilian episode of Roberto Rossellini's ''Paisà'' which he first saw on television alongside his relatives, who were themselves Sicilian immigrants, made a significant impact on his life. He acknowledges owing a great debt to the French New Wave and has stated that "the French New Wave has influenced all filmmakers who have worked since, whether they saw the films or not." He has also cited filmmakers like Satyajit Ray, Ingmar Bergman, Michelangelo Antonioni, Federico Fellini as a major influence on his career. His initial desire to become a priest while attending Cardinal Hayes High School in the Bronx gave way to cinema, and, consequently, Scorsese enrolled in NYU's University College of Arts and Science, (now known as the College of Arts and Science), where he earned a B.A. in English in 1964. He went on to earn his M.F.A. from NYU's Tisch School of the Arts in 1966, a year after the school was founded.

Family

Scorsese has been married five times. His first wife was Laraine Marie Brennan; they have a daughter, Catherine. He married the writer Julia Cameron in 1976; they have a daughter, Domenica Cameron-Scorsese, who is an actress and appeared in ''The Age of Innocence'', but the marriage lasted only a year. The divorce was acrimonious and served as the basis of Cameron's first feature, the dark comedy, ''God's Will'', which also starred their daughter, Domenica. Their daughter also had a small role in ''Cape Fear'' using the name Domenica Scorsese and has continued to act, write, direct and produce.

He was married to actress Isabella Rossellini from 1979 to their divorce in 1983. He then married producer Barbara De Fina in 1985; their marriage ended in divorce as well, in 1991. He has been married to Helen Morris since 1999; they have a daughter, Francesca, who appeared in ''The Departed'' and ''The Aviator''. He is primarily based in New York City.

Scorsese has commented, "I'm a lapsed Catholic. But I am Roman Catholic, there's no way out of it."

Career

Early career

Scorsese attended New York University's film school (B.A., English, 1964; M.F.A., film, 1966) making the short films ''What's a Nice Girl Like You Doing in a Place Like This?'' (1963) and ''It's Not Just You, Murray!'' (1964). His most famous short of the period is the darkly comic ''The Big Shave'' (1967), which features Peter Bernuth. The film is an indictment of America's involvement in Vietnam, suggested by its alternative title ''Viet '67''. Scorsese has mentioned on several occasions that he was greatly inspired in his early days at New York University by his Armenian-American film professor Haig P. Manoogian.

In 1967, Scorsese made his first feature-length film, the black and white ''I Call First'', which was later retitled ''Who's That Knocking at My Door'' with his fellow students actor Harvey Keitel and editor Thelma Schoonmaker, both of whom were to become long-term collaborators. This film was intended to be the first of Scorsese's semi-autobiographical 'J.R. Trilogy', which also would have included his later film, ''Mean Streets''.

1970s

From there he became friends with the influential "movie brats" of the 1970s: Francis Ford Coppola, Brian De Palma, George Lucas, and Steven Spielberg. It was Brian De Palma who introduced Scorsese to Robert De Niro. During this period he worked as the assistant director and one of the editors on the documentary ''Woodstock'' and met actor-director John Cassavetes, who would also go on to become a close friend and mentor.

''Mean Streets''

In 1972 Scorsese made the Depression-era exploiter ''Boxcar Bertha'' for B-movie producer Roger Corman, who had also helped directors such as Francis Ford Coppola, James Cameron, and John Sayles launch their careers. It was Corman who taught Scorsese that entertaining films could be shot with next to no money or time, preparing the young director well for the challenges to come with ''Mean Streets''. Following the film's release, Cassavetes encouraged Scorsese to make the films that he wanted to make, rather than someone else's projects.

Championed by influential movie critic Pauline Kael, ''Mean Streets'' was a breakthrough for Scorsese, De Niro, and Keitel. By now the signature Scorsese style was in place: macho posturing, bloody violence, Catholic guilt and redemption, gritty New York locale (though the majority of ''Mean Streets'' was actually shot in Los Angeles), rapid-fire editing, and a rock soundtrack. Although the film was innovative, its wired atmosphere, edgy documentary style, and gritty street-level direction owed a debt to directors Cassavetes, Samuel Fuller, and early Jean-Luc Godard. (Indeed the film was completed with much encouragement from Cassavetes, who felt ''Boxcar Bertha'' was undeserving of the young director's prodigious talent.)

In 1974, actress Ellen Burstyn chose Scorsese to direct her in ''Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore'', for which she won an Academy Award for Best Actress. Although well regarded, the film remains an anomaly in the director's early career, as it focuses on a central female character. Returning to Little Italy to explore his ethnic roots, Scorsese next came up with Italianamerican, a documentary featuring his parents, Charles and Catherine Scorsese.

''Taxi Driver''

''Taxi Driver'' followed in 1976 – Scorsese's dark, urban nightmare of one lonely man's slow, deliberate descent into insanity.

The film established Scorsese as an accomplished filmmaker and also brought attention to cinematographer Michael Chapman, whose style tends towards high contrasts, strong colors and complex camera movements. The film starred Robert De Niro as the troubled and psychotic Travis Bickle. The film co-starred Jodie Foster in a highly controversial role as an underage prostitute, and Harvey Keitel as her pimp, Matthew, called "Sport."

''Taxi Driver'' also marked the start of a series of collaborations between Scorsese and writer Paul Schrader, whose influences included the diary of would-be assassin Arthur Bremer and ''Pickpocket'', a film by the French director Robert Bresson. Writer/director Schrader often returns to Bresson's work in films such as ''American Gigolo'', ''Light Sleeper'', and Scorsese's later ''Bringing Out the Dead''.

Already controversial upon its release, ''Taxi Driver'' hit the headlines again five years later, when John Hinckley, Jr. made an assassination attempt on then-President Ronald Reagan. He subsequently blamed his act on his obsession with Jodie Foster's ''Taxi Driver'' character (in the film, De Niro's character, Travis Bickle, makes an assassination attempt on a senator).

''Taxi Driver'' won the Palme d'Or at the 1976 Cannes Film Festival, also receiving four Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, although all were unsuccessful.

Scorsese was subsequently offered the role of Charles Manson in the movie ''Helter Skelter'' and a part in Sam Fuller's war movie ''The Big Red One'', but he turned both down. However he did accept the role of a gangster in exploitation movie ''Cannonball'' directed by Paul Bartel. In this period there were also several directorial projects that never got off the ground including ''Haunted Summer'', about Mary Shelley and a film with Marlon Brando about the Indian massacre at Wounded Knee.

''New York, New York'' and ''The Last Waltz''

The critical success of ''Taxi Driver'' encouraged Scorsese to move ahead with his first big-budget project: the highly stylized musical ''New York, New York''. This tribute to Scorsese's home town and the classic Hollywood musical was a box-office failure.

''New York, New York'' was the director's third collaboration with Robert De Niro, co-starring with Liza Minnelli (a tribute and allusion to her father, legendary musical director Vincente Minnelli). The film is best remembered today for the title theme song, which was popularized by Frank Sinatra. Although possessing Scorsese's usual visual panache and stylistic bravura, many critics felt its enclosed studio-bound atmosphere left it leaden in comparison to his earlier work.

Despite its weak reception, the film is regarded by some to be among the director's finest achievements. Richard Brody in the ''New Yorker'' wrote: "For Scorsese, a lifelong cinephile, the essence of New York could be found in its depiction in classic Hollywood movies. Remarkably, his backward-looking tribute to the golden age of musicals and noirish romantic melodramas turned out to be one of his most freewheeling and personal films." Jean-Luc Godard is another admirer of the film.

The disappointing reception that ''New York, New York'' received drove Scorsese into depression. By this stage the director had also developed a serious cocaine addiction. However, he did find the creative drive to make the highly regarded ''The Last Waltz'', documenting the final concert by The Band. It was held at the Winterland Ballroom in San Francisco, and featured one of the most extensive lineups of prominent guest performers at a single concert, including Eric Clapton, Neil Young, Neil Diamond, Ringo Starr, Muddy Waters, Joni Mitchell, Bob Dylan, Paul Butterfield, Ronnie Wood and Van Morrison. However, Scorsese's commitments to other projects delayed the release of the film until 1978.

Another Scorsese-directed documentary entitled ''American Boy'' also appeared in 1978, focusing on Steven Prince, the cocky gun salesman who appeared in ''Taxi Driver''. A period of wild partying followed, damaging the director's already fragile health.

Scorsese also helped provide footage for the documentary ''Elvis on Tour''.

1980s

''Raging Bull''

By several accounts (Scorsese's included), Robert De Niro practically saved Scorsese's life when he persuaded Scorsese to kick his cocaine addiction to make his highly regarded film, ''Raging Bull''. Convinced that he would never make another movie, he poured his energies into making this violent biopic of middleweight boxing champion Jake LaMotta, calling it a Kamikaze method of film-making. The film is widely viewed as a masterpiece and was voted the greatest film of the 1980s by Britain's ''Sight & Sound'' magazine. It received eight Oscar nominations, including Best Picture, Best Actor for Robert De Niro, and Scorsese's first for Best Director. De Niro won, as did Thelma Schoonmaker for editing, but Best Director went to Robert Redford for ''Ordinary People''.

''Raging Bull'', filmed in high contrast black and white, is where Scorsese's style reached its zenith: ''Taxi Driver'' and ''New York, New York'' had used elements of expressionism to replicate psychological points of view, but here the style was taken to new extremes, employing extensive slow-motion, complex tracking shots, and extravagant distortion of perspective (for example, the size of boxing rings would change from fight to fight). Thematically too, the concerns carried on from ''Mean Streets'' and ''Taxi Driver'': insecure males, violence, guilt, and redemption.

Although the screenplay for ''Raging Bull'' was credited to Paul Schrader and Mardik Martin (who earlier co-wrote ''Mean Streets''), the finished script differed extensively from Schrader's original draft. It was re-written several times by various writers including Jay Cocks (who went on to co-script later Scorsese films ''The Age of Innocence'' and ''Gangs of New York''). The final draft was largely written by Scorsese and Robert De Niro.

The American Film Institute chose ''Raging Bull'' as the #1 American sports film on their list of the top 10 sports films.

''The King of Comedy''

Scorsese's next project was his fifth collaboration with Robert De Niro, ''The King of Comedy'' (1983). A satire on the world of media and celebrity, it was an obvious departure from the more emotionally committed films he had become associated with. Visually, it was far less kinetic than the style Scorsese had developed up until this point, often using a static camera and long takes. The expressionism of his recent work here gave way to moments of almost total surrealism. It still bore many of Scorsese's trademarks, however, such as its focus on a troubled loner who ironically becomes famous through a criminal act (murder and kidnapping, respectively).

''The King of Comedy'' failed at the box office, but has become increasingly well regarded by critics in the years since its release. German director Wim Wenders numbered it among his fifteen favourite films. Also, Scorsese apparently believes that this is the best performance De Niro ever gave for him.

Next Scorsese made a brief cameo appearance in the movie ''Anna Pavlova'' (also known as ''A Woman for All Time''), originally intended to be directed by one of his heroes, Michael Powell. This led to a more significant role in Bertrand Tavernier's jazz movie ''Round Midnight''.

In 1983 Scorsese began work on a long-cherished personal project, ''The Last Temptation of Christ'', based on the 1951 (English translation 1960) novel written by Nikos Kazantzakis, who was introduced to the director by actress Barbara Hershey when they were both attending New York University in the late 1960s. The movie was slated to shoot under the Paramount Pictures banner, but shortly before principal photography was to commence, Paramount pulled the plug on the project, citing pressure from religious groups. In this aborted 1983 version, Aidan Quinn was cast as Jesus, and Sting was cast as Pontius Pilate. (In the 1988 version, these roles were played respectively by Willem Dafoe and David Bowie.)

''After Hours''

After the collapse of this project Scorsese again saw his career at a critical point, as he described in the documentary ''Filming for Your Life: Making 'After Hours''' (2004). He saw that in the increasingly commercial world of 1980s Hollywood, the highly stylized and personal 1970s films he and others had built their careers on would not continue to enjoy the same status. Scorsese decided then on an almost totally new approach to his work. With ''After Hours'' (1985) he made an aesthetic shift back to a pared-down, almost "underground" film-making style – his way of staying viable. Filmed on an extremely low budget, on location, and at night in the SoHo neighborhood of Manhattan, the film is a black comedy about one increasingly misfortunate night for a mild New York word processor (Griffin Dunne) and featured cameos by such disparate actors as Teri Garr and Cheech and Chong. A bit of a stylistic anomaly for Scorsese, ''After Hours'' fits in well with popular low-budget "cult" films of the 1980s, e.g. Jonathan Demme's ''Something Wild'' and Alex Cox's ''Repo Man''.

''The Color of Money''

Along with the 1987 Michael Jackson music video "Bad", in 1986 Scorsese made ''The Color of Money'', a sequel to the much admired Robert Rossen film ''The Hustler'' (1961) with Paul Newman. Although typically visually assured, ''The Color of Money'' was the director's first foray into mainstream commercial film-making. It won actor Paul Newman a belated Oscar and gave Scorsese the clout to finally secure backing for a project that had been a long time goal for him: ''The Last Temptation of Christ''. He also made a brief venture into television, directing an episode of Steven Spielberg's ''Amazing Stories''.

''The Last Temptation of Christ''

After his mid-80s flirtation with commercial Hollywood, Scorsese made a major return to personal film-making with the Paul Schrader-scripted ''The Last Temptation of Christ'' in 1988. Based on Nikos Kazantzakis's controversial 1960 book, it retold the life of Christ in human rather than divine terms. Even prior to its release the film caused a massive furore, worldwide protests against its blasphemy effectively turning a low budget independent movie into a media sensation. Most controversy centered on the final passages of the film which depicted Christ marrying and raising a family with Mary Magdalene in a Satan-induced hallucination while on the cross.

Looking past the controversy, ''The Last Temptation of Christ'' gained critical acclaim and remains an important work in Scorsese's canon: an explicit attempt to wrestle with the spirituality which had under-pinned his films up until that point. The director went on to receive his second nomination for a Best Director Academy Award (again unsuccessfully, this time losing to Barry Levinson for ''Rain Man'').

Along with directors Woody Allen and Francis Ford Coppola, in 1989 Scorsese provided one of three segments in the portmanteau film ''New York Stories'', called "Life Lessons".

1990s

''Goodfellas''

After a decade of mostly mixed results, Gangster epic ''Goodfellas'' (1990) was a return to form for Scorsese and his most confident and fully realized film since ''Raging Bull''. De Niro and Joe Pesci in ''Goodfellas'' offered a virtuoso display of the director's bravura cinematic technique and re-established, enhanced, and consolidated his reputation. After the film was released Roger Ebert, a friend and supporter of Scorsese, named ''Goodfellas'' "the best mob movie ever" and is ranked #1 on Roger's movie list for 1990, along with Gene Siskel and Peter Travers, the film is widely considered one of the director's greatest achievements.

However, ''Goodfellas'' also signified an important shift in tone in the director's work, inaugurating an era in his career which was technically accomplished but some have argued emotionally detached. Despite this, many view ''Goodfellas'' as a Scorsese archetype – the apogee of his cinematic technique.

The film was nominated for six Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Director, Scorsese earned his third Best Director nomination for ''Goodfellas'' but again lost to a first-time director, Kevin Costner (''Dances With Wolves''). Joe Pesci earned the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in ''Goodfellas''. Scorsese and the film won over a numerous of different awards, including five BAFTA Awards, a Silver Lion and more.

After the film, ''Goodfellas'' was acknowledged as the second best in the gangster film genre (after ''The Godfather''). The American Film Institute put ''Goodfellas'' at #94 on the AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies list and on the 2007 updated version they moved ''Goodfellas'' up to #92 on the AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies list (10th Anniversary Edition) and they put ''Goodfellas'' at #2 on their list of the top 10 Gangster films.

In 1990, he acted in a cameo role as Vincent van Gogh in the film ''Dreams'' by legendary Japanese director Akira Kurosawa.

''Cape Fear''

1991 brought ''Cape Fear'', a remake of a cult 1962 movie of the same name, and the director's seventh collaboration with De Niro. Another foray into the mainstream, the film was a stylized thriller taking its cues heavily from Alfred Hitchcock and Charles Laughton's ''The Night of the Hunter'' (1955). ''Cape Fear'' received a mixed critical reception and was lambasted in many quarters for its scenes depicting misogynistic violence. However, the lurid subject matter did give Scorsese a chance to experiment with a dazzling array of visual tricks and effects. The film garnered two Oscar nominations. Earning eighty million dollars domestically, it would stand as Scorsese's most commercially successful release until ''The Aviator'' (2004), and then ''The Departed'' (2006). The film also marked the first time Scorsese used wide-screen Panavision with an aspect ratio of 2.35:1.

''The Age of Innocence''

The opulent and handsomely mounted ''The Age of Innocence'' (1993) was on the surface a huge departure for Scorsese, a period adaptation of Edith Wharton's novel about the constrictive high society of late-19th Century New York. It was highly lauded by critics upon original release, but was a box office bomb. As noted in ''Scorsese on Scorsese'' by editor/interviewer Ian Christie, the news that Scorsese wanted to make a film about a 19th Century failed romance raised many eyebrows among the film fraternity all the more when Scorsese made it clear that it was a personal project and not a studio for-hire job.

Scorsese was interested in doing a "romantic piece". His friend, Jay Cocks gave him the Wharton novel in 1980, suggesting that this should be the romantic piece Scorsese should film as Cocks felt it best represented his sensibility. In ''Scorsese on Scorsese'' he noted that:

::''"Although the film deals with New York aristocracy and a period of New York history that has been neglected, and although it deals with code and ritual, and with love that's not unrequited but unconsummated – which pretty much covers all the themes I usually deal with – when I read the book, I didn't say, 'Oh good, all those themes are here.'"''

Scorsese, who was strongly drawn to the characters and the story of Wharton's text, wanted his film to be as rich an emotional experience as the book was to him rather than the traditional academic adaptations of literary works. To this aim, Scorsese sought influence from diverse period films which made an emotional impact on him. In ''Scorsese on Scorsese'', he documents influences from films such as Luchino Visconti's ''Senso'' and his ''Il Gattopardo'' as well as Orson Welles's ''The Magnificent Ambersons'' and also Roberto Rossellini's ''La Prise de pouvoir par Louis XIV''. Although ''The Age of Innocence'' was ultimately different than these films in terms of narrative, story and thematic concern, the presence of a lost society, of lost values as well as detailed re-creations of social customs and rituals continues the tradition of these films.

Recently, it has started to come back into the public eye, especially in countries such as the UK and France, but still is largely neglected in North America. The film earned five Academy Award nominations (including for Scorsese for Best Adapted Screenplay), winning the Costume Design Oscar. It also made a significant impact on directors such as Chinese auteur Tian Zhuangzhuang, and British filmmaker Terence Davies, both of whom ranked it among their ten favorite films.

This was his first collaboration with the Academy Award winning actor, Daniel Day-Lewis, with whom he would work again in ''Gangs of New York''.

''Casino''

1995's expansive ''Casino'', like ''The Age of Innocence'' before it, focused on a tightly wound male whose well-ordered life is disrupted by the arrival of unpredictable forces. The fact that it was a violent gangster film made it more palatable to fans of the director who perhaps were baffled by the apparent departure of the earlier film. Critically, however, ''Casino'' received mixed notices. In large part this was due to its huge stylistic similarities to his earlier ''Goodfellas'', and its excessive violence that garnered it a reputation as possibly the most violent American gangster film ever made . Indeed many of the tropes and tricks of the earlier film resurfaced more or less intact, most obviously the casting of both Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci, Pesci once again being an unbridled psychopath. Sharon Stone was nominated for the Best Actress Academy Award for her performance.

During the filming Scorsese played a background part as a gambler at one of the tables. It is quite often rumored that a real game of poker was being held at the time between extras and that a pot of $2000 was at stake.

''A Personal Journey with Martin Scorsese Through American Movies''

Scorsese still found time for a four hour documentary in 1995 offering a thorough trek through American cinema. It covered the silent era to 1969, a year after which Scorsese began his feature career, stating "I wouldn't feel right commenting on myself or my contemporaries."

''Kundun''

If ''The Age of Innocence'' alienated and confused some fans, then ''Kundun'' (1997) went several steps further, offering an account of the early life of Tenzin Gyatso, the 14th Dalai Lama, the People's Liberation Army's entering of Tibet, and the Dalai Lama's subsequent exile to India. Not least a departure in subject matter, ''Kundun'' also saw Scorsese employing a fresh narrative and visual approach. Traditional dramatic devices were substituted for a trance-like meditation achieved through an elaborate tableau of colourful visual images.

The film was a source of turmoil for its distributor, Disney, who was planning significant expansion into the Chinese market at the time. Initially defiant in the face of pressure from Chinese officials, Disney has since distanced itself from the project, hurting ''Kundun'''s commercial profile.

In the short term, the sheer eclecticism in evidence enhanced the director's reputation. In the long term however, it generally appears ''Kundun'' has been sidelined in most critical appraisals of the director, mostly noted as a stylistic and thematic detour. ''Kundun'' was the director's second attempt to profile the life of a great religious leader, following ''The Last Temptation of Christ''.

''Bringing Out the Dead''

''Bringing Out the Dead'' (1999) was a return to familiar territory, with the director and writer Paul Schrader constructing a pitch-black comic take on their own earlier ''Taxi Driver''. Like previous Scorsese-Schrader collaborations, its final scenes of spiritual redemption explicitly recalled the films of Robert Bresson. (It's also worth noting that the film's incident-filled nocturnal setting is reminiscent of ''After Hours''.) It received generally positive reviews, although not the universal critical acclaim of some of his other films. It stars Nicolas Cage, Ving Rhames, John Goodman, Tom Sizemore, and Patricia Arquette.

2000s

''Gangs of New York''

In 1999 Scorsese also produced a documentary on Italian filmmakers entitled ''Il Mio Viaggio in Italia'', also known as ''My Voyage to Italy''. The documentary foreshadowed the director's next project, the epic ''Gangs of New York'' (2002), influenced by (amongst many others) major Italian directors such as Luchino Visconti and filmed in its entirety at Rome's famous Cinecittà film studios.

With a production budget said to be in excess of $100 million, ''Gangs of New York'' was Scorsese's biggest and arguably most mainstream venture to date. Like ''The Age of Innocence'', it was set in 19th-century New York, although focusing on the other end of the social scale (and like that film, also starring Daniel Day-Lewis). The film also marked the first collaboration between Scorsese and actor Leonardo DiCaprio, who since then has become a fixture in later Scorsese films.

The production was highly troubled with many rumors referring to the director's conflict with Miramax boss Harvey Weinstein. Despite denials of artistic compromise, ''Gangs of New York'' revealed itself to be the director's most conventional film: standard film tropes which the director had traditionally avoided, such as characters existing purely for exposition purposes and explanatory flashbacks, here surfaced in abundance. The original score composed by regular Scorsese collaborator Elmer Bernstein was rejected at a late stage for a score by Howard Shore and mainstream rock artists U2 and Peter Gabriel. The final cut of the movie ran to 168 minutes, while the director's original cut was over 180 minutes in length. The film still received generally positive reviews with the review tallying website Rotten Tomatoes reporting that 75% of the reviews they tallied for the film were positive and summarizing the critics by saying "Though flawed, the sprawling, messy Gangs of New York is redeemed by impressive production design and Day-Lewis's electrifying performance."

Nonetheless, the themes central to the film were consistent with the director's established concerns: New York, violence as culturally endemic, and sub-cultural divisions down ethnic lines.

Originally filmed for a release in the winter of 2001 (to qualify for Academy Award nominations), Scorsese delayed the final production of the film until after the beginning of 2002; the studio consequently delayed the film for nearly a year until its release in the Oscar season of late 2002.

''Gangs of New York'' earned Scorsese his first Golden Globe for Best Director. In February 2003, ''Gangs of New York'' received ten Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Actor for Daniel Day-Lewis, however it did not win in any category.

Scorsese also had uncredited involvement as executive producer with the 2002 film ''Deuces Wild'', written by Paul Kimatian.

''The Blues''

The following year Scorsese completed production of ''The Blues'', an expansive seven part documentary tracing the history of blues music from its African roots to the Mississippi Delta and beyond. Seven film-makers including Wim Wenders, Clint Eastwood, Mike Figgis, and Scorsese himself each contributed a 90 minute film (Scorsese's entry was entitled "Feel Like Going Home").

''The Aviator''

Scorsese's film ''The Aviator'' (2004), was a lavish, large-scale biopic of eccentric aviation pioneer and film mogul Howard Hughes and would reunite Scorsese with actor Leonardo DiCaprio. The film received highly positive reviews. The film also met with widespread box office success and gained Academy recognition.

''The Aviator'' was nominated for six Golden Globe awards, including ''Best Motion Picture – Drama'', ''Best Director'', ''Best Screenplay'', and ''Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama'' for Leonardo DiCaprio. It won three, including ''Best Motion Picture – Drama and Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama''. In January 2005, ''The Aviator'' became the most-nominated film of the 77th Academy Awards nominations, nominated in 11 categories including Best Picture. The film also garnered nominations in nearly all of the other major categories, including a fifth Best Director nomination for Scorsese, Best Actor in a Leading Role (Leonardo DiCaprio), Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Cate Blanchett), and Alan Alda for Best Actor in a Supporting Role. Despite having a leading tally, the film ended up with only five Oscars: Best Actress in a Supporting Role, Best Art Direction, Best Costume Design, Best Film Editing and Best Cinematography. Scorsese lost again, this time to director Clint Eastwood for ''Million Dollar Baby'' (which also won Best Picture).

''No Direction Home''

''No Direction Home'' is a documentary film by Martin Scorsese that tells of the life of Bob Dylan, and his impact on American popular music and culture of the 20th century. The film does not cover Dylan's entire career; it focuses on his beginnings, his rise to fame in the 1960s, his then-controversial transformation from an acoustic guitar-based musician and performer to an electric guitar-influenced sound and his "retirement" from touring in 1966 following an infamous motorcycle accident. The film was first presented on television in both the United States (as part of the PBS ''American Masters'' series) and the United Kingdom (as part of the BBC Two ''Arena'' series) on September 26–27, 2005. A DVD version of the film was released that same month. The film won a Peabody award. In addition, Scorsese received an Emmy nomination for it.

''The Departed''

Scorsese returned to the crime genre with the Boston-set thriller ''The Departed'', based on the Hong Kong police drama ''Infernal Affairs''. Along with Matt Damon, Leonardo Di Caprio, ''The Departed'' was Scorsese's first collaboration with Jack Nicholson and Martin Sheen.

''The Departed'' opened to widespread critical acclaim with some proclaiming it as one of the best efforts Scorsese had brought to the screen since 1990's ''Goodfellas'', and still others putting it at the same level as Scorsese's most celebrated classics ''Taxi Driver'' and ''Raging Bull''. With domestic box office receipts surpassing $129,402,536, ''The Departed'' was Scorsese's highest grossing film (not accounting for inflation) until 2010's ''Shutter Island''.

Martin Scorsese's direction of ''The Departed'' earned him his second Golden Globe for Best Director, as well as a Critic's Choice Award, his first Director's Guild of America Award, and the Academy Award for Best Director. While being presented with the award, Scorsese said "Could you double-check the envelope?" It was presented to him by his longtime friends and colleagues Steven Spielberg, Francis Ford Coppola, and George Lucas. ''The Departed'' also received the Academy Award for the Best Motion Picture of 2006, Best Adapted Screenplay, and Best Film Editing by longtime Scorsese editor Thelma Schoonmaker, her third win for a Scorsese film, though many thought Scorsese deserved Academy Awards in his past films as well.

''Shine a Light''

''Shine a Light'' is a concert film of rock and roll band The Rolling Stones' performances at New York City's Beacon Theater on October 29 and November 1, 2006, intercut with brief news and interview footage from throughout the band's career.

The film was initially scheduled for release on September 21, 2007, but Paramount Classics postponed its general release until April 2008. Its world premiere was at the opening of the 58th Berlinale Film Festival on February 7, 2008.

2010s

''Shutter Island''

On October 22, 2007, ''Daily Variety'' reported that Scorsese would reunite with Leonardo DiCaprio on a fourth picture, ''Shutter Island''. Principal photography on the Laeta Kalogridis screenplay, based on the novel of the same name by Dennis Lehane, began in Massachusetts in March 2008.

In December 2007, actors Mark Ruffalo, Max von Sydow, Ben Kingsley, and Michelle Williams joined the cast, marking the first time these four actors have worked with Scorsese. The film was released on February 19, 2010. On May 20, 2010, the film was Scorsese's highest grossing film.

''Boardwalk Empire''

Scorsese directed the series premiere for ''Boardwalk Empire'', an HBO drama series, starring Steve Buscemi and Michael Pitt, and based upon Nelson Johnson's book ''Boardwalk Empire: The Birth, High Times and Corruption of Atlantic City''. Terence Winter, who previously wrote for ''The Sopranos'', created the series. In addition to directing the pilot, Scorsese will also serve as an executive producer on the series.

The series premiered on September 19, 2010 and was renewed for a second season.

''George Harrison: Living in the Material World''

Scorsese directed a three-and-a-half-hour documentary about the life and music of former Beatles member George Harrison, which premiered in the United States on HBO over two parts on October 5 and 6, 2011.

''Hugo''

''Hugo'' is a 3D adventure drama film based on Brian Selznick's novel ''The Invention of Hugo Cabret''. The film stars Asa Butterfield, Chloë Grace Moretz, Ben Kingsley, Sacha Baron Cohen, Ray Winstone, Emily Mortimer and Jude Law. The film has been met with critical acclaim and earned Scorsese his third Golden Globe Award for Best Director. The film was also nominated for eleven Academy Awards.

This is Scorsese’s first film shot in 3D and was released in the US on November 23, 2011.

Future films

Scorsese has announced several potential future projects. A documentary feature on Scorsese by artist Melinda Camber Porter was nearly complete when she lost her life to cancer.

After the release of his newest film, ''Hugo'', Scorsese anticipates filming an adaptation of Shusaku Endo's novel ''Silence'', a drama about the voyages of two Portuguese Jesuit priests in Japan during the 17th Century. Scorsese had originally planned ''Silence'' as his next project following ''Shutter Island.'' Scorsese reported that his long-planned Frank Sinatra biopic is coming up, with Phil Alden Robinson writing the screenplay. He is also attached to direct ''The Irishman'', which will star Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci and Al Pacino. It has also been announced that Scorsese is attached to direct an adaptation of Norwegian crime writer Jo Nesbø's novel ''The Snowman''.

Collaborations with Robert De Niro

Scorsese frequently collaborated with Robert De Niro, making a total of eight films with the actor. After being introduced to him in the early 1970s, Scorsese cast De Niro in his 1973 film ''Mean Streets''. Three years later, De Niro starred in ''Taxi Driver'', this time holding the lead role. De Niro re-joined Scorsese for ''New York, New York'' in 1977, but the film was unsuccessful. Nevertheless, their partnership continued into the 1980s, when the pair made ''Raging Bull'', which was highly successful, and ''The King of Comedy''. In the 1990s, De Niro starred in ''Goodfellas'', one of the pair's most praised films, and 1991's ''Cape Fear'', before making ''Casino ''in 1995. The two also voiced major parts in the 2004 film ''Shark Tale''. Scorsese and De Niro plan to re-unite for a film referred to as ''The Irishman'' based on the book ''I Heard You Paint Houses'', although a date for the project is uncertain.

Honors

In 2007, Scorsese was listed among ''Time'' magazine's 100 Most Influential People in The World.

In August 2007 Scorsese was named the 2nd greatest director of all time in a poll by ''Total Film'' magazine, in front of Steven Spielberg and behind Alfred Hitchcock.

In 2007, Scorsese was honored by the National Italian American Foundation (N.I.A.F.) at the nonprofit's thirty-second Anniversary Gala. During the ceremony, Scorsese helped launch N.I.A.F.'s Jack Valenti Institute, which provides support to Italian film students in the U.S., in memory of former Foundation Board Member and past president of the Motion Picture Association of America (M.P.A.A.) Jack Valenti. Scorsese received his award from Mary Margaret Valenti, Jack's widow. Certain pieces of Scorsese's film related material and personal papers are contained in the Wesleyan University Cinema Archives to which scholars and media experts from around the world may have full access. In 2011 Scorsese received an honorary doctorate from the National Film School in Lodz. At the awards ceremony he said, "I feel like I'm a part of this school and that I attended it", paying tribute to the films of Wajda, Munk, Has, Polanski and Skolimowski.

Director trademarks

Begins his films with segments taken from the middle or end of the story. Examples include ''Raging Bull'' (1980), ''Goodfellas'' (1990), ''Casino'' (1995), and ''The Last Waltz''. Frequent use of slow motion, e.g. ''Mean Streets'' (1973), ''Taxi Driver'' (1976), ''Raging Bull'' (1980), and ''Goodfellas'' (1990) . Also known for using freeze frame, such as the opening credits of ''The King of Comedy'' (1983), and throughout ''Goodfellas'' (1990). His lead characters are often morally ambiguous, prone to violence, and/or want to be accepted in society or a society (The Departed, Mean Streets, Taxi Driver, Goodfellas) and are not infrequently sociopaths (Cape Fear, Raging Bull, Casino).

In most of his films the main character often falls in love and has a wife, and often has a turning point between the main character and the wife. e.g. ''Raging Bull'', ''Goodfellas'', and ''Casino''.

His blonde leading ladies are usually seen through the eyes of the protagonist as angelic and ethereal; they wear white in their first scene and are photographed in slow-motion (Cybill Shepherd in ''Taxi Driver''; Cathy Moriarty's white bikini in ''Raging Bull''; Sharon Stone's white minidress in ''Casino''). This may possibly be a nod to director Alfred Hitchcock. Often uses long tracking shots. Example: ''Goodfellas'' (1990) Use of MOS sequences set to popular music or voice over, often involving aggressive camera movement and/or rapid editing.

The supporting actor will often betray the protagonist (Micheal in ''Mean Streets'', Judas Iscariot in ''The Last Temptation of Christ'', Jimmy Conway in ''Goodfellas'', Nicky Santoro in ''Casino'')

Often has a quick cameo in his films (''Mean Streets'', ''Taxi Driver'', ''The King of Comedy'', ''After Hours'', ''The Last Temptation of Christ'' (albeit hidden under a hood), ''Casino'', ''The Age of Innocence'', ''Gangs of New York'', ''Hugo''). Also, often contributes his voice to a film without showing his face on screen. He provides the opening voice-over narration in ''Mean Streets'' and ''The Color of Money''; plays the off-screen dressing room attendant in the final scene of ''Raging Bull''; provides the voice of the unseen ambulance dispatcher in ''Bringing out the Dead''. Frequently uses New York City as the main setting in his films, e.g. ''Gangs of New York'', ''Taxi Driver'', ''The Age of Innocence'', ''The King of Comedy'', ''After Hours'', ''New York, New York'', and ''Mean Streets''.

Sometimes highlights characters in a scene with an iris, an homage to 1920s silent film cinema (as scenes at the time sometimes used this transition). This effect can be seen in ''Casino'' (it is used on Sharon Stone and Joe Pesci), ''Life Lessons'', and ''The Departed'' (on Matt Damon).

Some of his films include references/allusions to Westerns, particularly ''Shane'', ''The Searchers'' and ''The Oklahoma Kid''.

More recently, his films have featured corrupt authority figures, such as policemen in ''The Departed'' and politicians in ''Gangs of New York'' and ''The Aviator''.

Guilt is a prominent theme in many of his films, as is the role of Catholicism in creating and dealing with guilt (''Raging Bull, Goodfellas, Bringing Out the Dead, Mean Streets, Who's That Knocking at My Door, Shutter Island'').

Slow motion flashbulbs and accented camera/flash/shutter sounds.

The song ''Gimme Shelter'' by the Rolling Stones is heard in several of Scorsese's films, including ''Goodfellas'', ''Casino'' and ''The Departed''.

Some of his films are inspired by a true story. Examples: ''Raging Bull'', ''Goodfellas'', and ''Casino''.

Frequent collaborations

Scorsese often casts the same actors in his films, particularly Robert De Niro, who collaborated with Scorsese for eight films. Included are the three films (''Raging Bull'', ''Taxi Driver'', and ''Goodfellas'') that made AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movies list. Scorsese has often said he thinks De Niro's best work under his direction was Rupert Pupkin in ''The King of Comedy''. Most recently, Scorsese has found a new muse with young actor Leonardo DiCaprio, with whom he has collaborated for four films, with two others confirmed to be in the works. Several critics have compared Scorsese's new partnership with DiCaprio with his previous one with De Niro. Other frequent collaborators include Victor Argo (6), Harry Northup (6), Harvey Keitel (5), Murray Moston (5), Joe Pesci (3), Frank Vincent (3) and Verna Bloom (3). Daniel Day-Lewis, who had become very reclusive to the Hollywood scene, Alec Baldwin, Ben Kingsley, Jude Law, Emily Mortimer, John C. Reilly, Frank Sivero, and Ray Winstone have also appeared in multiple Scorsese films. Before their deaths, Scorsese's parents, Charles Scorsese and Catherine Scorsese, appeared in bit parts, walk-ons or supporting roles, most notably in ''Goodfellas''.

For his crew, Scorsese frequently worked with editor Thelma Schoonmaker, cinematographers Michael Ballhaus and Robert Richardson, screenwriters Paul Schrader Mardik Martin, and John Logan, costume designer Sandy Powell, production designer Dante Ferretti, and composers Robbie Robertson, Howard Shore and Elmer Bernstein. Schoonmaker, Richardson, Powell, and Ferretti have all won Academy Awards in their respective categories on collaborations with Scorsese. Elaine and Saul Bass, the latter being Hitchcock's frequent title designer, designed the opening credits for ''Goodfellas'', ''The Age of Innocence'', ''Casino'' and ''Cape Fear''. He was the executive producer of the film ''Brides'', which was directed by Pantelis Voulgaris and starred Victoria Haralabidou, Damien Lewis, Steven Berkoff and Kosta Sommer.

! Actor/Actress

! ''Who's That Knocking at My Door'' (1968)

! ''Boxcar Bertha'' (1972)

! ''Mean Streets'' (1973)

! ''Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore'' (1974)

! ''Taxi Driver'' (1976)

! ''New York, New York (film)>New York, New York'' (1977)

! ''Raging Bull'' (1980)

! ''The King of Comedy (1983 film)>The King of Comedy'' (1983)

! ''After Hours (film)>After Hours'' (1985)

! ''The Color of Money'' (1986)

! ''The Last Temptation of Christ (film)>The Last Temptation of Christ'' (1988)

! ''Goodfellas'' (1990)

! ''Cape Fear (1991 film)>Cape Fear'' (1991)

! ''The Age of Innocence (film)>The Age of Innocence'' (1993)

! ''Casino (film)>Casino'' (1995)

! ''Kundun'' (1997)

! ''Bringing Out the Dead'' (1999)

! ''Gangs of New York'' (2002)

! ''The Aviator (2004 film)>The Aviator'' (2004)

! ''The Departed'' (2006)

! ''Shutter Island (film)>Shutter Island'' (2010)

! ''Hugo (film)>Hugo'' (2011)

! Victor Argo

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Awards and recognitions

Scorsese received the AFI Life Achievement Award in 1997.

In 1998, the American Film Institute placed three Scorsese films on their list of the greatest movies in America: ''Raging Bull'' at #24, ''Taxi Driver'' at #47 and ''Goodfellas'' at #94. For their tenth anniversary edition of the list, ''Raging Bull'' was moved to #4, ''Taxi Driver'' was moved to #52 and ''Goodfellas'' was moved to #92.

Scorsese received the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic on January 18, 2001.

In 2001, AFI put two Scorsese films on their list of the most "heart-pounding movies" in American cinema: ''Taxi Driver'' at #22 and ''Raging Bull'' at #51.

On June 17, 2008, AFI put two of Scorsese's films on the AFI's 10 Top 10 list: ''Raging Bull'' at #1 for the Sports genre and ''Goodfellas'' at #2 for the Gangster genre.

At a ceremony in Paris, France, on January 5, 2005, Martin Scorsese was awarded the French Legion of Honor in recognition of his contribution to cinema.

In 2007, Scorsese won the Academy Award for Best Director for ''The Departed'', which also won Best Picture.

On September 11, 2007, the Kennedy Center Honors committee, which recognizes career excellence and cultural influence, named Scorsese as one of the honorees for the year.

Scorsese was the recipient of the 2010 Cecil B. DeMille Award at the 67th Golden Globe Awards.

On September 18, 2011, at the 63rd Primetime Emmy Awards, Scorsese won in the category Outstanding Directing for a Drama Series, for his work on the series premiere of ''Boardwalk Empire''.

On January 15, 2012, at the 69th Golden Globe Awards, Scorsese won an award for Best Director on the 2011 movie ''Hugo''. Scorsese has earned praise from many film legends including Ingmar Bergman, Frank Capra, Jean-Luc Godard, Werner Herzog, Elia Kazan, Akira Kurosawa, David Lean, Michael Powell, Satyajit Ray, and François Truffaut.

Filmography

See also

List of film collaborations

References

External links

Martin Scorsese Bibliography (via UC Berkeley)

They Shoot Pictures, Don't They?

Martin Scorsese Life in Pictures Interview recorded at BAFTA London – 2010

Scorsese interviews on ''BBC''

1999 Princeton Q&A; lecture (RealMedia video)

Podcast: Scorsese Discusses His Digital Workflow Techniques

Martin Scorsese's response to a Proust Questionnaire

Category:1942 births Category:Living people Category:Academy Award winners category:Actors from New York City Category:American documentary filmmakers Category:American film actors Category:American film directors Category:American film directors of Italian descent Category:American film editors Category:American film producers Category:American music video directors Category:American people of Sicilian descent Category:American Roman Catholics Category:American screenwriters Category:American voice actors Category:BAFTA winners (people) Category:Best Director Academy Award winners Category:Best Director Golden Globe winners Category:César Award winners Category:Emmy Award winners Category:Film theorists Category:Grammy Award winners Category:Kennedy Center honorees Category:Légion d'honneur recipients Category:New York Democrats Category:People from Queens

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name	Nicole Atkins
background	solo_singer
born	October 01, 1978Neptune, New Jersey, U.S.
instrument	Guitar (Hagstrom Viking, Fender Jazzmaster, Martin D15)
genre	Psychedelic, alternative, folk rock
years active	2002–present
label	Razor & Tie Records, Columbia, Red Ink
website	www.nicoleatkins.com }}

Nicole Atkins (born October 1, 1978) is an American singer-songwriter best known for her work with the band Nicole Atkins & the Sea. Her sound is known for its mix of traditional vocal styles and introspective lyrics. She has been compared to Roy Orbison and singers from the Brill Building era.

Early life

Atkins was born in Neptune, New Jersey. She grew up in Shark River Hills, a middle class enclave within Neptune overlooking the Shark River. Atkins has cited the river (technically a bay) as a major inspiration for her music, particularly the imagery of “the river in the rain” found in the title track on her album ''Neptune City''. She started playing piano when she was 9 and taught herself to play guitar at 13. Her first music purchase, at the suggestion of an uncle, was a cassette of Traffic’s ''John Barleycorn Must Die''. She eschewed more popular acts of the day for musical groups her parents listened to, such as The Ronettes and Johnny Cash. She has also cited The Sundays’ Harriet Wheeler as a major early influence on her own singing style. She started playing in pick-up bands and doing gigs at local coffeehouses while attending St. Rose High School in the nearby town of Belmar.

Career

North Carolina and New York

After high school, Atkins moved to Charlotte, North Carolina to study illustration at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. She ingrained herself within the city’s independent music scene, discovering bands like Superchunk and Uncle Tupelo. She also started writing original songs and making friends with other local musicians. Among other bands, she joined a supergroup in the city called Nitehawk that, at one point, had almost 30 members. Atkins spent her junior year abroad in Australia. After she returned, she joined the band Los Parasols, releasing an EP with them entitled ''The Summer of Love'' in 2002. That same year, Atkins moved to the neighborhood of Bensonhurst in Brooklyn, New York. She began performing at open mic night at the Sidewalk Café in Manhattan’s East Village. Influenced by the artists on Rainbow Quartz, the independent record label specializing in guitar heavy pop music and traditional songwriting for which she worked, she moved away from the louder rock music she’d played in North Carolina and toward the songcraft style of Wilco and Roy Orbison. She returned briefly to Charlotte, living in a wood shop and playing with several bands, most notably a group called Virginia Reel. At this time, she started writing what she termed “a mix of Americana, 60s, and indie rock.” She also recorded her EP ''Bleeding Diamonds''.

She moved back to her parents’ house in New Jersey in 2004, working odd jobs and playing local gigs. During a regular Friday night stand at Kelly’s Tavern in nearby Neptune City, the audience kept requesting cover songs by local favorites Bruce Springsteen and Jon Bon Jovi. In response, Atkins got drunk and played a tongue-in-cheek version of Bon Jovi’s “Livin' on a Prayer”. She was not asked back.

During this time, she commuted into New York by train to play gigs and maintain a connection to the city’s underground music scene. In mid-2004, Atkins and David Muller, who had played drums with Fischerspooner and The Fiery Furnaces, started working on a demo CD entitled ''Party’s Over''. They recorded most of the album in Atkins’ parents’ house using a Casio keyboard, a ProTools rig, and a mini recorder. Drum parts were recorded at Muller’s apartment in Manhattan, with further tracks recorded at the Dietch Projects gallery in Brooklyn.

The Sea and ''Neptune City''

In early 2005, keyboardist Dan Chen, whom Atkins knew from her days at The Sidewalk Café, approached Atkins about forming a new group. Chen told Atkins he knew of a drummer, Dan Mintzer, who might also be interested in playing with her. When the three sat down together for the first time, Chen and Mintzer already knew how to play the songs they’d heard on Atkins' MySpace page. Eventually David Hollinghurst, another friend from The Sidewalk Café, joined the band on guitar and Derek Layes was brought on as bassist. The band, now known as Nicole Atkins & The Sea, was given a residency at the small showcase bar, Piano's, and won the attention of music industry attorney Gillian Bar. Atkins' ''Party’s Over'' demo had stirred interest from heavy metal label Roadrunner Records, among others. She soon found herself in the midst of a bidding war between record labels and signed with Columbia Records in January 2006. In late 2006, Atkins and the Sea traveled to Sweden to record her debut album, ''Neptune City'', at Varispeed Studios in Kalgerup and Gula Studion in Malmö with producer Tore Johansson. The album was originally scheduled for a July 2007 release, but at the behest of Columbia co-chairman Rick Rubin, it was pushed back until October 30, 2007 to accommodate re-mastering the album. It debuted at number 20 on Billboard’s Top Heatseekers chart and reached number 6 on the Heatseekers Middle Atlantic Chart.

The Black Sea and ''Mondo Amore''

In May 2009, The Sea disbanded and Atkins started collaborating on several new tracks with drummer Christopher Donofrio, guitarist Brad York, and bassist Anthony Chick. Atkins tentatively titled this lineup "The Black Sea". By July 2009, Atkins had ended her professional relationship with Columbia Records.

In January 2010, Atkins and The Black Sea started recording new material at Brooklyn's Seaside Lounge studio with producer Phil Palazzolo, with whom Atkins had previously worked during sessions for A.C. Newman's second solo album, ''Get Guilty''. Several other musicians joined Atkins in the studio to record the tracks for what would become her second album, ''Mondo Amore'', including guitarist Irina Yalkowsky and bassist Jeremy Kay. Along with drummer Ezra Oklan, Yalkowsky and Kay would form the core lineup of the The Black Sea with whom Atkins would tour in support of ''Mondo Amore''. In June 2010, Atkins signed with New York-based independent label Razor & Tie. The label released ''Mondo Amore'' on February 8, 2011.

Other work

In 2008, Atkins was cast as the voice of the mother in director Geoff Marslett’s animated sci-fi comedy film “Mars.”. On September 9 of that year, she released a four track EP of cover songs called ''Nicole Atkins Digs Other People's Songs'', which included the tracks: "The Crystal Ship" (The Doors), "Dream a Little Dream of Me" (The Mamas & the Papas), "Under the Milky Way" (The Church) and "Inside of Love" (Nada Surf). In 2009, Atkins' backing vocals were featured prominently on AC Newman's second solo album, Get Guilty.

Atkins also joined the 9th annual Independent Music Awards judging panel to assist independent musicians' careers.

When not on the road, she lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Influence of David Lynch

Atkins has often cited director David Lynch, known for his surreal films set in small towns, as an inspiration. Like Atkins, Lynch studied art in college and moved overseas with the intention of continuing his studies. And just as Atkins worked as a muralist while developing her music, Lynch worked as a cartoonist on the side during the 1980s. Lynch’s cinematic style, which uses dreamlike sequences and montages, heavily influenced the video for Atkins' song “The Way It Is.” Atkins also feels a kinship with Angelo Badalamenti, who has scored many of Lynch’s films. She once emailed an mp3 of “The Way It Is” to Badalamenti, who is said to have replied, “I think our Sicilian great-great-great-grandparents must have laid down on a picnic blanket in the park and done something together, if you know what I mean.” Atkins subsequently received an invitation to Badalamenti's home in Morristown, New Jersey to talk music.

Television appearances

American Express commercial

Prior to the release of ''Neptune City'', Atkins and the Sea filmed a television commercial for the American Express credit card's "Are You A Cardmember?" campaign. The song sampled throughout the ad is "Party's Over" from the album ''Neptune City''.

Old Navy Summer 2008 commercial

''Maybe Tonight'' off the ''Neptune City'' album, has been used in two TV spots / web minisodes for the Old Navy Summer 2008 Spotlight Collection. The two commercials follow the girls from the Spring 2008 commercials as they prepare for the ''2008 MTV Movie Awards''.

''The Late Show with David Letterman''

Atkins appeared twice within three months on the late night television show ''The Late Show with David Letterman'' in 2007. On the August 27th show, she performed as part of a chorus backing up Canadian singer-songwriter Feist on the latter’s “1 2 3 4". The chorus, all dressed in white, also included members of Broken Social Scene, The National, Grizzly Bear, The New Pornographers, and Mates of State, as well as photographer Mary Rozzi. On the October 30th show, the same day ''Neptune City'' was released, Atkins and The Sea performed “The Way It Is.” Host David Letterman offered an enthusiastic response and jokingly asked Atkins, “Wanna get some steak?” after the song was over. She returned to the ''Late Show'' April 13, 2009 as a guest vocalist for A.C. Newman, with whom she had been touring earlier in the year, playing the tambourine and singing on his song "Like A Hitman, Like A Dancer".

''Later... with Jools Holland''

On September 19, 2008, Atkins made her British television debut on the BBC late night music show, ''Later... with Jools Holland'', performing her songs "The Way It Is" and "Maybe Tonight". The show's other guests included Sway, Metallica, VV Brown, Carla Bruni, and Kings of Leon.

Discography

with Los Parasols

2002: ''The Summer of Love'' (EP)

Compilations

2008: ''The Hotel Café Presents Winter Songs'' Epic

(Atkins contributed a cover of Billy Hayes' and Jay Johnson's Blue Christmas)

2009: ''Scott Walker – 30 Century Man''

(Atkins contributed a cover of Scott Walker's The Seventh Seal

Solo

2005: ''Party’s Over'' (demo)

2006: ''Bleeding Diamonds'', ''EP'' Columbia

2007: ''Neptune City'' Columbia

2008: ''Nicole Atkins Digs Other People's Songs'', ''EP'' Columbia

2011: ''Mondo Amore''

Awards and nominations

2002

Asbury Music Awards winner: Top Female Vocalist

Asbury Music Awards Winner: Best Solo Act

Asbury Music Awards Winner: Song of the Year – "Neptune City"

2005

ASCAP Foundation winner: Sammy Cahn Award – "Neptune City"

References

External links

Nicole Atkins – official website.

Nicole Atkins on YouTube

Nicole Atkins on Twitter

Category:1978 births Category:Living people Category:American singer-songwriters Category:Columbia Records artists Category:Musicians from New Jersey Category:People from Neptune Township, New Jersey Category:University of North Carolina at Charlotte alumni Category:American people of Sicilian descent Category:American musicians of Italian descent

es:Nicole Atkins fy:Nicole Atkins pt:Nicole Atkins

name	Karl Malden
birth date	March 22, 1912
birth place	Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
death date	July 01, 2009
death place	Brentwood, Los Angeles, California, U.S.
birth name	Mladen George Sekulovich
nationality	American
education	Emerson High School
alma mater	DePaul University
home town	Gary, Indiana (raised)
occupation	Actor
years active	1936–2000
spouse	Mona Greenberg (m. 1938-2009) (his death)
children	Mila Malden and Carla Malden
parents	Petar Sekulovic,Minnie (nee Sebera) Sekulovich }}

Karl Malden (born Mladen George Sekulovich, Serbian Cyrillic: Младен Ђорђе Секуловић ''(Mladen Đorđe Sekulović)''; March 22, 1912 – July 1, 2009) was an American actor. In a career that spanned more than seven decades, he featured in classic Marlon Brando films such as ''A Streetcar Named Desire'', ''On the Waterfront'' and ''One-Eyed Jacks''. Among other notable film roles were Archie Lee Meighan in ''Baby Doll'', Zebulon Prescott in ''How the West Was Won'' and General Omar Bradley in ''Patton''. His best-known role was on television as Lt. Mike Stone on the 1970s crime drama, ''The Streets of San Francisco''. During the 1970s and 1980s, he was the spokesman for American Express.

Early life

Malden, the eldest of three brothers, was born in Chicago, Illinois and raised in Gary, Indiana. His Serbian father, Petar Sekulović (1886–1975), worked in the steel mills and as a milkman, and his mother, Minnie (née Sebera) Sekulovich (1892–1995), was a Czech seamstress and actress. The Sekulovich family roots trace back to Podosoje near the city of Bileća in Bosnia and Herzegovina, more specifically, in the Herzegovinian part. Malden spoke only the Serbian language until he was in kindergarten and was fluent in the language until his death. He was also proud of his Serbian heritage. Malden's father had a passion for music, and organized a choir. As a teenager, Malden joined the Karageorge Choir. In addition, his father produced Serbian plays at his church and taught acting. A young Malden took part in many of these plays, which included a version of ''Jack and the Beanstalk'', but mostly centered on the community's Serbian heritage. In high school, he was a popular student and the star of the basketball team (according to his autobiography, Malden broke his nose twice while playing, taking elbows to the face and resulting in his trademark bulbous nose). He participated in the drama department, and was narrowly elected senior class president. Among other roles, he played Pooh Bah in ''The Mikado''. After graduating from Emerson High School in 1931 with high marks, he briefly planned to leave Gary for Arkansas, where he hoped to win an athletic scholarship, but college officials did not admit him owing to his refusal to play any sport besides basketball. From 1931 until 1934, he worked in the steel mills, as had his father.

He changed his name from Mladen Sekulovich to Karl Malden at age 22. He anglicized his first name by switching the letters "l" and "a" and making it his last name; then he proceeded to take his grandfather's first name. This was because the first theatre company he was in wanted him to shorten his name for the marquee. He thought they wanted to fire him and were using his name as an excuse; although that wasn't the case, he still changed his name so as to give them no excuse.

Malden often found ways to say "Sekulovich" in films and television shows in which he appears. For example, as General Omar Bradley in ''Patton'', as his troops slog their way through enemy fire in Sicily, Malden says "Hand me that helmet, Sekulovich" to another soldier. In ''Dead Ringer'', as a police detective in the squad room, Malden tells another detective: "Sekulovich, gimme my hat." In ''Fear Strikes Out'', Malden, playing Jimmy Piersall's father John, introduces Jimmy to a baseball scout named Sekulovich. In ''Birdman of Alcatraz'', as a prison warden touring the cell block, Malden recites a list of inmates' names, including Sekulovich. Malden's father was not pleased, as he told his son 'Mladen, no Sekulovich has ever been in prison!' Perhaps the most notable usage of his real name was in the TV series ''The Streets of San Francisco''. Malden's character in the program, Mike Stone, employed a legman (played by Art Metrano) with that name, who did various errands. Also, in ''On the Waterfront'', in which Malden plays the priest, among the names of the officers of Local 374 called out in the courtroom scene is Mladen Sekulovich, Delegate.

Education and early stage work

In September 1934, Malden decided to leave his home in Gary, Indiana, to pursue formal dramatic training at the Goodman School (later part of DePaul University), then associated with the Goodman Theater in Chicago. Although he had worked in the steel mills in Gary for three years, he had helped support his family, and was thus unable to save enough money to pay for his schooling. Making a deal with the director of the program, he gave the institute the little money that he did have, with the director agreeing that, if Malden did well, he would be rewarded with a full scholarship. He won the scholarship. When Malden performed in the Goodman's children's theater, he wooed the actress Mona Greenberg (stage name: Mona Graham), who married him in 1938. He graduated from the Chicago Art Institute in 1937. Soon after, without work and without money, Malden returned to his hometown.

Acting career circa World War II

He eventually traveled to New York City, and first appeared as an actor on Broadway in 1937. He did some radio work and in a small role made his film debut in ''They Knew What They Wanted''. He also joined the Group Theatre, where he began acting in many plays and was introduced to a young Elia Kazan, who would later work with him on ''A Streetcar Named Desire'' (1951) and ''On the Waterfront'' (1954).

His acting career was interrupted by World War II, during which he served as a noncommissioned officer in the 8th Air Force. While in the service, he was given a small role in the United States Army Air Forces play and film ''Winged Victory''. After the war ended in 1945, he resumed his acting career, playing yet another small supporting role in the Maxwell Anderson play ''Truckline Cafe'', with a then-unknown Marlon Brando. He was given a co-starring role in the Arthur Miller play ''All My Sons'' with the help of director Elia Kazan. With that success, he then crossed over into steady film work.

Film career: 1950s to 1970s

Malden resumed his film acting career in the 1950s, starting with ''The Gunfighter'' (1950) and ''Halls of Montezuma'' (1950). The following year, he was in ''A Streetcar Named Desire'' (1951), playing Mitch, Stanley Kowalski's best friend who starts a romance with Blanche DuBois (Vivien Leigh). For this role, he won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

Other films during this period include Alfred Hitchcock's ''I Confess'' with Montgomery Clift and Anne Baxter (1953), ''On the Waterfront'' (1954), where he played a priest who influenced Terry Malloy (Marlon Brando) to testify against mobster-union boss Johnny Friendly (Lee J. Cobb). In ''Baby Doll'' (1956), he played a power-hungry sexual man who had been frustrated by a teenage wife. He starred in dozens of films from the late 1950s to the early 1970s, such as ''Fear Strikes Out'' (1957), ''Pollyanna'' (1960), ''Birdman of Alcatraz'' (1962), ''Gypsy'' (1962), ''How the West Was Won'' (1962), ''The Cincinnati Kid'' (1965), and ''Patton'' (1970), playing General Omar Bradley. After ''Summertime Killer'' (1972), he appeared in the made-for-television film ''The Hijacking of the Achille Lauro'' (1989) (as Leon Klinghoffer).

Malden’s wife, Mona, the former Mildred Greenberg, graduated from Roosevelt High School in Emporia, Kansas where she attended Kansas State Teachers College, now Emporia State University. He first visited the campus with her in 1959 and was impressed by the ESU Summer Theatre. He returned in the summer of 1964 to teach, working with the actors in the company. Upon leaving, he gave his honorarium to establish the Karl Malden Theater Scholarship still given today.

In 1963, he was a member of the jury at the 13th Berlin International Film Festival.

Television work

In 1972, Malden was approached by producer Quinn Martin about starring as Lt. Mike Stone in ''The Streets of San Francisco''. Although the concept originated as a made-for-television movie, ABC quickly signed on to carry it as a series. Martin hired Michael Douglas to play Lt. Stone's young partner, Inspector Steve Keller.

Malden's father was delighted about this series being in San Francisco, as he had intended to settle in that city, but had to change his plans as he'd arrived on the day of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake.

On ''Streets'', Malden played a widowed veteran cop with more than 20 years of experience who is paired with a young officer recently graduated from college. During its first season, it was a ratings winner among many other 1970s crime dramas, and served as ABC's answer to such shows as ''Hawaii Five-O'', ''Adam-12'', ''Ironside'', ''Barnaby Jones'', ''Kojak'', ''McMillan & Wife'', ''Police Woman'', ''The Rockford Files'', and ''Switch''.

During the second season, production shifted from Los Angeles to San Francisco. For his work as Lt. Stone, Malden was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor - Drama Series four times between 1974 and 1977, but never won. After two episodes in the fifth season, Douglas left the show to act in movies; Douglas had also produced the film ''One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest'' in 1975. Lt. Stone's new partner was Inspector Dan Robbins, played by Richard Hatch. The show took a ratings nosedive, and ABC canceled it after five seasons and 119 episodes.

In 1980, Malden starred in ''Skag'', an hour-long drama that focused on the life of a foreman at a Pittsburgh steel mill. Malden described his character, Pete Skagska, as a simple man trying to keep his family together. The pilot episode for the series had Skag temporarily disabled by a stroke, and explored the effects it had on his family and co-workers. While ''Skag'' met with poor ratings, critics praised it, in instances there were even full page ads taken out in newspapers in an attempt to keep the program from being taken off the air. Nevertheless the series was canceled after several episodes.

Malden's last role in film or television was in 2000 in the highly acclaimed first season episode of ''The West Wing'' titled "Take This Sabbath Day". Malden portrayed a Catholic priest and used the same Bible he had used in ''On the Waterfront''.

Other work

Malden famously delivered the line "Don't leave home without them!" in a series of U.S. television commercials for American Express Travelers Cheques in the 1970s and 1980s. He also advertised the American Express Card, with the famous opening line, "Do you know me?"

Malden was a member of the United States Postal Service's 16-member Citizens' Stamp Advisory Committee, which meets to review recommendations for U.S. commemorative postage stamps.

Personal life

On December 18, 1938, Malden married Mona Greenberg, who survives him. Their marriage was one of the longest in Hollywood's history, lasting more than 70 years. In addition to his wife, Malden is survived by daughters Mila and Carla; his sons-in-law; three granddaughters, Alison, Emily, and Cami; plus four great-grandchildren, Mila, Stella, Charlie, and Thomas Karl.

In 1997, Malden published his autobiography, ''When Do I Start?'', written with his daughter Carla.

Death

Malden died at his home in the Brentwood section of Los Angeles on July 1, 2009 at the age of 97. He is said to have died of natural causes. Malden's manager said, "It could be many things. I mean, he was 97 years old!" He is said to have been in poor health for several years.

Malden's friend and former co-star Michael Douglas wrote a tribute to Malden for ''Time'' magazine's "Milestones" section.

He is buried at the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery, Westwood, California, United States.

Awards and recognition

Malden won the 1951 Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for ''A Streetcar Named Desire'' and was nominated in 1954 for his supporting role in ''On the Waterfront''. Malden was a past president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. In October 2003, he was named the 40th recipient of the Screen Actors' Guild's Life Achievement Award for career achievement and humanitarian accomplishment.

In 1985, he was awarded an Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Limited Series for his performance as Freddy Kassab in ''Fatal Vision''. During the same year, he was also awarded an honorary doctor degree in fine arts by Emporia State University.

In May 2001, Malden received an honorary degree, Doctor of Humane Letters, from Valparaiso University. Michael Douglas, his former "The Streets of San Francisco" co-star, presented Malden with a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Screen Actors Guild on February 22, 2004. On November 11, 2004, Douglas also presented Malden with the Monte Cristo Award of the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center in Waterford, Connecticut, which is given for "distinguished careers exemplifying Eugene O'Neill's standard of excellence and pioneering spirit." Among other past winners were Jason Robards, Zoe Caldwell, Edward Albee, August Wilson and Brian Dennehy.

On November 12, 2005, the United States House of Representatives authorized the United States Postal Service to rename the Los Angeles Barrington Postal Station as the Karl Malden Postal Station in honor of Malden's achievements. The bill, H.R. 3667, was sponsored by Representatives Henry Waxman and Diane Watson.

For his contribution to the film industry, Malden has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6231 Hollywood Blvd. In 2005, he was inducted into the Western Performers Hall of Fame at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.

Filmography

''Charlie Chan at the Opera'' (1936) (uncredited)

''They Knew What They Wanted'' (1940)

''Winged Victory'' (1944)

''13 Rue Madeleine'' (1947)

''Boomerang'' (1947)

''Kiss of Death'' (1947)

''The Gunfighter'' (1950)

''Where the Sidewalk Ends'' (1950)

''Halls of Montezuma'' (1951)

''A Streetcar Named Desire'' (1951)

''The Sellout'' (1952)

''Diplomatic Courier'' (1952)

''Operation Secret'' (1952)

''Ruby Gentry'' (1952)

''I Confess'' (1953)

''Take the High Ground!'' (1953)

''Phantom of the Rue Morgue'' (1954)

''On the Waterfront'' (1954)

''Baby Doll'' (1956)

''Fear Strikes Out'' (1957)

''Bombers B-52'' (1957)

''Time Limit'' (1957) (director)

''The Hanging Tree'' (1959)

''Pollyanna'' (1960)

''The Great Impostor'' (1961)

''One-Eyed Jacks'' (1961)

''Parrish'' (1961)

''All Fall Down'' (1962)

''Birdman of Alcatraz'' (1962)

''How the West Was Won'' (1962)

''Gypsy'' (1962)

''Come Fly with Me'' (1963)

''Dead Ringer'' (1964)

''Cheyenne Autumn'' (1964)

''The Cincinnati Kid'' (1965)

''Nevada Smith'' (1966)

''Murderers' Row'' (1966)

''Hotel'' (1967)

''The Adventures of Bullwhip Griffin'' (1967)

''Billion Dollar Brain'' (1967)

''Blue'' (1968)

''Hot Millions'' (1968)

''Patton'' (1970)

''The Cat o' Nine Tails'' (1971)

''Wild Rovers'' (1971)

''Summertime Killer'' (1972)

''Beyond the Poseidon Adventure'' (1979)

''Meteor'' (1979)

''Miracle on Ice'' (1981)

''Twilight Time'' (1982)

''The Sting II'' (1983)

''Dario Argento's World of Horror'' (1985) (documentary)

''Billy Galvin'' (1986)

''Nuts'' (1987)

''Broadway: The Golden Age, by the Legends Who Were There'' (2003)

Television miniseries

''Fatal Vision'' (1984)

''Alice in Wonderland'' (1985)

References

External links

Category:1912 births Category:2009 deaths Category:20th-century actors Category:Actors from Indiana Category:Actors Studio alumni Category:American film actors Category:American military personnel of World War II Category:American people of Czech descent Category:American people of Serbian descent Category:American stage actors Category:American television actors Category:American television personalities Category:Best Supporting Actor Academy Award winners Category:Burials at Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery Category:DePaul University alumni Category:Disease-related deaths in California Category:Emmy Award winners Category:People from Gary, Indiana Category:Presidents of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences Category:Valparaiso University people

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