Hal Pereira

Hal Pereira
Born(1905-04-29)April 29, 1905
Chicago, Illinois, U.S.
DiedDecember 17, 1983(1983-12-17) (aged 78)
Los Angeles, California, U.S.
Occupationsart director and production designer
Years active1944–1968

Hal Pereira (April 29, 1905 – December 17, 1983) was an American art director, production designer, and occasional architect.

Biography

Pereira was born in Chicago, Illinois, the brother of William Pereira and son of Sarah (Friedberg) and Saul Pereira. He was educated at the University of Illinois, after which he started his career in theater design before moving to Los Angeles c. 1941,[1] where he worked as a unit art director for Paramount Studios.

From the 1940s through the 1960s, Pereira worked on more than 200 films as an art director and production designer. In 1944, he art designed Double Indemnity, widely considered to be one of the greatest films of all time.[2][3][4][5][6] By 1950, Pereira was supervising art director, where he remained until the late 1960s, when Paramount was reorganized by Gulf+Western. During this time, he worked on several notable films, including Shane, Academy Award for Best Picture winning The Greatest Show on Earth, almost every important Alfred Hitchcock film, and The Rose Tattoo, for which he won the Academy Award for best art direction for a black and white film. In total, Pereira was nominated for 23 Academy Awards throughout his career and he also served alongside Earl Hedrick as artistic director of the TV series Bonanza.[7]

Pereira also worked occasionally as an architect. He began his architecture career in Chicago, where he partnered with his brother in 1931. Together, they worked on Esquire Theatre[1] and a house for Charles Dewey Jr.,[8] son of Charles S. Dewey.[9] Pereira left the partnership c. 1940, at which point he collaborated with Robert Law Weed and Edwin T. Reeder on Beach Theatre in Miami, Florida.[1] He also remodeled Paramount Theatre's Metropolitan Annex in Los Angeles in 1941.[10]

He died in Los Angeles, California.

References

  1. ^ a b c Michelson, Alan. "Hal Pereira (Architect)". Pacific Coast Architecture Database. University of Washington. Retrieved February 10, 2026.
  2. ^ "Entertainment Weekly's 100 Greatest Movies of All Time". Filmsite. Archived from the original on 31 March 2014. Retrieved 19 January 2009.
  3. ^ "100 Essential Films by The National Society of Film Critics". Filmsite. Archived from the original on July 16, 2021. Retrieved July 16, 2021.
  4. ^ Schickel, Richard (13 January 2010). "Double Indemnity". Time. Archived from the original on May 18, 2021. Retrieved July 16, 2021.
  5. ^ Debruge, Peter, et al. (December 21, 2022). "The 100 Greatest Movies of All Time". Variety. Archived from the original on December 21, 2022. Retrieved February 27, 2023.
  6. ^ "100 Best Movies of All Time That You Should Watch Immediately". Time Out. Archived from the original on May 31, 2022. Retrieved March 27, 2023.
  7. ^ "The 28th Academy Awards (1956) Nominees and Winners". Oscars.org. Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Retrieved June 7, 2019.
  8. ^ Michelson, Alan. "Pereira and Pereira, Architects (Partnership)". Pacific Coast Architecture Database. University of Washington. Retrieved February 10, 2026.
  9. ^ "Charles Dewey, Jr., Investment Advisor". The New York Times. May 2, 1974. Retrieved May 22, 2019.
  10. ^ Michelson, Alan. "Grauman's Metropolitan Theatre and Office Building, Downtown, Los Angeles, CA". Pacific Coast Architecture Database. University of Washington. Retrieved February 10, 2026.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.