Film Critic David Thomson On The Career Of Elia Kazan

David Thomson, British-born film critic, is author of highly-praised biographies of Hollywood personalities and histories of the American film world. In 2005 he toured as the editor of Fan-Tan (2005), a never-before-published novel co-authored by deceased screen legend Marlon Brando and filmmaker Donald Cammell. While at the New York State Writers Institute in 2005 he discussed the career of Elia Kazan, the controversial director of On The Waterfront (1954) who later testified in support of the Hollywood Blacklist of Joseph McCarthy.

David Thomson is perhaps best-known among film enthusiasts for reference work, A Biographical Dictionary of Film. First published in 1975, the work has since undergone three major revisions (the fourth edition appeared as the New Biographical Dictionary of Film in (2002). Thomson's other books include The Whole Equation: A History of Hollywood (2004), In Nevada: The Land, the People, God, and Chance (1999), Rosebud: The Story of Orson Welles (1996), Showman: The Life of David O. Selznick (1992), and Warren Beatty and Desert Eyes: A Life and a Story (1987).