Lias Kazancıoğlu (Greek: Elia Kazancıoğlu) was born in Istanbul into a family of Greek cotton traders. In 1913, he and his family emigrated to New York, where his father became a carpet trader. After studying at a Massachusetts college, he enrolled at Yale University in the Department of Dramatic Art. In the 1930s, Kazan performed with the New York Theatre Group, which included Lee Strasberg, Clifford Odets, Luther and Stella Adler. Since 1934, Kazan has been a secret member of the Communist Party
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Lias Kazancıoğlu (Greek: Elia Kazancıoğlu) was born in Istanbul into a family of Greek cotton traders. In 1913, he and his family emigrated to New York, where his father became a carpet trader. After studying at a Massachusetts college, he enrolled at Yale University in the Department of Dramatic Art. In the 1930s, Kazan performed with the New York Theatre Group, which included Lee Strasberg, Clifford Odets, Luther and Stella Adler. Since 1934, Kazan has been a secret member of the Communist Party for almost two years. By the early 1940s, Elia Kazan had become one of New York’s most prominent theater directors, cementing a strong place among the city’s elite. As an actor, he successfully showed himself in productions of Men in White Coats, Waiting for Lefty, Johnny Johnson, Golden Boy and Liliom, and his directorial talent was demonstrated by the plays Streetcar Desire (1947), Cat on a Hot Roof (1955), written by Tennessee Williams, as well as productions of All My Sons and Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller. For the last two, as well as for the play "J.B." Elia Kazan received Tony Awards. In addition to the theater, Elia Kazan successfully proved himself as a talented film director, who created such famous films as The Gentleman's Agreement (1947) and In the Port (1954), which earned him two Oscars. He also directed the films Streetcar Desire (1951), East of Paradise (1955), Face in the Crowd (1957), Wild River (1960) and Magnificence in the Grass (1961). Elia Kazan was married three times. The first two marriages ended with the death of his spouses, and the third lasted until his own death. The director died on September 28, 2003 in New York at the age of 94. The figure of Elia Kazan was very controversial in American acting circles. In 1952, at a hearing before the Committee to Investigate Un-American Activities, he openly revealed the names of his associates in the Communist Party, of which he was a member in the mid-1930s.[2] At the same time, Kazan became one of the few who issued eight of his former fellow actors, because of which they immediately got into the Hollywood Blacklist and their career soon ended. Many American actors never forgave him, and when Elia Kazan was awarded an honorary Oscar in 1999, some (Nick Nolte, Ed Harris) refused to applaud at all, and some (Stephen Spielberg, Jim Carrey) applauded sitting down. A protest against the award was also made by the French director Jules Dassen, who himself fell into the Hollywood Blacklist in the early 1950s.