His career as a cinematographer extended fifty years from the silent film Foolish Wives (1922) to Move (1970), although he was an uncredited camera operator on two earlier films (1919 and 1920). His major films included The Naked City (1948), filmed on the streets of New York, for which he won an Academy Award for Best Cinematography. He also was associate producer of a few films in the 1960s and was President of American Society of Cinematographers (1961–63).[6]
Erich von Stroheim: 1919-1925
Daniels on Merry-Go-Round (1923): “In the big banquet scene, Stroheim had all the extras playing Austrian officers really drunk; he served real champagne by the bucketful and whiskey as well. A girl stepped naked out of a punchbowl…Merry-Go-Round was a disaster for Stroheim.”[7]
Von Stroheim’s Greed involved six weeks of shooting in Death Valley in July and August of 1925, with the entire cast and crew on site. Daniel endured the heat and lack of amenities without complaint.[10] Photographically, his greatest challenge shooting Greed was integrating transitions from natural outdoor lighting with illuminated interiors that von Stroheim demanded in the famous marriage sequence shot in San Francisco: “[B]alancing the exposure was hell” Daniels recalled. He registered dismay with the director’s obsession for “realism” requiring that an underground mining sequence be shot in an actual shaft at a depth 3000 feet (915 meters), rather than near the surface, either of which would have produced the same visual effect. Daniels ended his association with von Stroheim after completing The Merry Widow in 1925.[11]
Greta Garbo: 1925-1936
When the 19-year-old Swedish actress Greta Garbo first arrived under contract at MGM studios in 1924, Daniels was enlisted to conduct her screen tests, specifically close-ups. He recalled that “she didn’t speak a word of English and was terrifically shy.”[12] After completing this essential, but painstaking “ordeal,” Daniels insisted that Garbo would henceforth work exclusively on closed sets (director and crew only present), in an effort to ease the young actresses “constant stage fright” and allowing her to focus on performing.[13]
Daniels acted as cinematographer on 16 pictures starring Garbo, the first The Temptress (1926) and the last Camille (1936).[14][15]
In the famous sequence in Queen Christina (1933), in which Garbo “memorizes” the features of the bedroom where she has made love with Antonio (John Gilbert), Daniels credits von Stroheim’s influence for its success: “I think I learned the realism in this scene, the way of achieving it, from von Stroheim.”[16][17]
^Higham, 1970 p. 161: Checklist. “Educated at University of Southern California.”
^Steeman, Albert. Internet Encyclopedia of Cinematographers, "William Daniels page," Rotterdam, The Netherlands, 2007. Last accessed: December 28, 2007.
^Higham, 1970 p. 62-63: Italics and ellipsis in original.
^Higham, 1970 p. 161: Checklist. “First [camera] operator at Universal (1918).”
