American Cinematographer - March 1993 - 53

Opposite:
During a visit to

mercials up

until about a
year ago, when he was 89
years old. "My agent still
gets calls," he says.
Within a year of
joining Gaumont, Young
worked his way out of the
laboratory and became an
assistant

cameraman.

the ASC

Clubhouse in

1989, Freddie

Young Iseated
in front, second
from left) is

surrounded by

admiring peers.
Standing, left to
right: John

"I

started loading cameras for
Arthur

Alonzo, Phil

Brown," Young

Lathrop, the late

says. "The roof of the stu¬
dio was made of glass. We

Lester Shorr,

Stanley Cortez,
Richard

exposed film by the light of
the

There

Glouner, Conrad
Hall, Al Taylor,
Haskell Wexler,

just a
lamps from France. It
was all flat, overhead light.

Allen Daviau

We lit for illumination. No

and Harry

sun.

were

few

one

as an

right: Woody
Omens, Young

art form."

The

sun

wasn't

a

and the late

very dependable means
for providing light. "It
would go behind the

Richard

Rawlings, Sr.
This page:

Young (far left)

clouds, and then every¬

thing would have to stop," Young
recalls. "That was a big problem.
Eventually, they painted the glass
black and brought in some more
lamps."
Young worked for Brown
for 10 years. By the mid-1920s, he
was driving the studio camera car,
projecting rushes and splicing the
film after the screenings, and occa¬
sionally hand-cranking a second
camera

for Brown. M.A. Wetherill,

shooting a film at Gaumont around
1926, noticed that Young was
imaginative and energetic behind
the second camera, and asked him
to shoot his next picture, Victory
1918. Young recalls that he was

paid 20 pounds, a princely sum
compared to his previous salary of
five pounds per film.
The following year, Young
shot White Cargo, the first sound
film in England. "It was actually a
silent film, but they brought me in
to shoot close-ups with dialogue,"
Young remembers. "Around that
time, Herbert Wilcox built the first
proper soundstage in England, and
I went to work with him."

Young spent 10 years with
Wilcox as chief cameraman for the
British Dominion Film Corpora¬
tion, emerging

during that period

of England's most talented
directors of photography. His cred¬

as one

Wolf.

Front row, left to

thought about lighting

observes

its included

with

That's

Kerr, Caesar and Cleopatra starring

pensively as
director Stanley

Vivian

Donen

the Dance, The Barretts

(foreground)

Goodnight Vienna,
Mischief, Nell
Gwyn and Victoria the Great.
a

Good Girl,

In

1937, Wilcox loaned

Young to M.G.M. in England,
where he shot the original Goodbye
Mr. Chips, directed by Sam Wood
and starring Robert Donat and
Greer Garson. The picture, its direc¬

Spencer Tracy and Debra

Leigh, lvanhoe, Invitation to
of Wimpole
Street, Lust for Life, I Accuse, Inn of the
Sixth Happiness and Indiscreet.
That wouldn't be

a

bad

rehearses

during
filming of
actors

Indiscreet in

England.

tor and both stars all earned Oscar

body of work for a career, but
Young was just getting started. He
was 57
years old when he left

nominations in 1939 (Donat won).
"If I could have awarded myself an

M.G.M. in 1959, and he had been in
the industry for 44 years - 34 of

the

camera

the

upcoming

Oscar for only one picture, it would

them

have been for

of his best work
him.

Young

says.
best work."

Goodbye Mr. Chips,"
"I believe it was my

During the late 1930s,
Young shot Sixty Glorious Years and
Nurse Cavell at RKO in Hollywood.
The latter was his last film with
Wilcox. He shot 49th Parallel and

Young Mr. Pitt as an independent
during the early 1940s
before entering the military service,

as a

cinematographer. Much
was

of the films I shot for Herbert
see each other for
many
years. When I was at M.G.M., I was
always busy. I'd finish one film and

didn't

start

American

and

served

as

chief

cameraman

for 15

The post-World War II pe¬
riod was the Golden Age of mov¬
ies in England, and Young was one
of the brightest stars in that galaxy.

years.

take.

Wilcox," Young says, "but we

March 1993

captain responsible for directing
shooting training films.
After he was discharged in
1944, Young signed a contract with
M.G.M. in England, where he

a

ready

Young first met Lean dur¬
ing the 1930s. "David edited some

His credits included Edward My Son

where he served for three years as

Young's
assistants

still ahead of

shooting another."
In 1959, hearing that
Young had left M.G.M., Lean con¬
tacted him about shooting Lawrence
of Arabia.
Lawrence was Young's first
experience with a Panavision
65mm camera, and he had plenty
of time to get familiar with it. The
film, shot in Spain and Majorca,
took two years to complete, includ¬
ing six months in the desert shoot¬
ing under canvas - most of the
time in artificially induced shad-

cameraman

Meanwhile,

Cinematographer

51

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