Ivory, James

Ivory, James (Francis)

(born June 7, 1928, Berkeley, Calif., U.S.) U.S. film director. While directing a documentary on India in the 1960s, he met a local producer, Ismail N. Merchant (b. 1936), beginning cinema's longest-lasting partnership. They made several films written by Ivory and Ruth Prawer Jhabvala before their first international success, Shakespeare Wallah (1965). It was followed by a series of well-received adaptations of noted literary works, including The Europeans (1979), The Bostonians (1984), A Room with a View (1986, Academy Award), Maurice (1987), Howards End (1992), and The Remains of the Day (1993). Ivory's films were noted for their attention to period detail and excellent acting.

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Ivory, James (1928–  ) film director; born in Berkeley, Calif. As a student at the University of Southern California he directed a short subject, Four in the Morning (1953), and was then commissioned by the Asia Society to go to India to make a documentary (1960). There, in partnership with a local producer, Ismail Merchant, he made a series of Indian-based films, climaxing with Shakespeare Wallah (1965), which Ivory also coscripted. Basing their company in the U.S.A. from the early 1970s, the Ivory-Merchant team enjoyed its greatest success with relatively pure adaptations of literary works, such as Henry James's The Europeans (1979) and E. M. Forster's A Room With a View (1987).