Daughter of composer and librettist Stanley Lupino and music-hall star Connie Emerald, Ida Lupino was born on February 4, 1918 in London. A pupil at the Clarence House School of Brighton, she soon becomes interested in theatre and
writes a play when aged 7. She enters the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art at 13 and
one year later she is touring in England. Filmmaker Allan Dwan spots her and hires
her for the feature “Her First Affair” (1933).

Then Ida Lupino leaves England for Hollywood. She makes her first film appearance there in 1934, next to swimming champion Buster Crabbe in “Search For Beauty” by
Erle C. Kenton. The following year she plays a more important part in Lewis Milestone’s musical “Paris In Spring”. William Wellman directs her in 1939’s drama “The Light That Failed”. The following year she signs with Warner Bros. and from now on focuses on dramatic roles. Ida Lupino receives in 1943 the New York Film Critics Award for her performance in “The Hard Way” by Vincent Sherman.

In 1948, Ida Lupino marries writer Collier Young and the following year they found
Emerald Productions, an independent filmmaking company, which is to become The Filmmakers. The same year, she co-writes with Paul Jarrico the screenplay for “Not Wanted” which veteran Elmer Clifton is to direct. But he suffers from bad health problems and when the shooting has just started she takes over as a director and finishes the film though she’s not credited for it. The movie is a success and Ida Lupino can go on with this new career as well as being an actress. She will thus direct independent films, tackling themes that other movies didn’t deal with: the condition of being paraplegic in “Never Fear” (1949), rape in “The Outrage” (1950), bigamy in “The Bigamist” (1953) or kidnapping in “The Hitch-hiker” (1953).

The bankruptcy of her company in 1953 stops her filmmaker’s career for a while, but five years later she’s directing again for television, and in 1966 she’s back with “The Trouble with Angels”, directing Rosalind Russell in a typical Hollywood comedy
for the big screen.
Ida Lupino died on August 3, 1995 in Burbank, California

Filmography

Director
1949 NEVER FEAR
1949 NOT WANTED
1950 OUTRAGE
1951 HARD, FAST AND BEAUTIFUL
1953 THE HITCH-HIKER
1953 THE BIGAMIST
1960 SYBILLA (Alfred Hitchcock presents, season 6, episode 10)
1961 A CRIME FOR MOTHERS (Alfred Hitchcock presents, season 6, episode 16)
1962 THE LITTLE HOURS (General Electric Theater, season 10, episode 18)
1966 THE TROUBLE WITH ANGELS
Writer
1949 NEVER FEAR
1950 OUTRAGE
1953 THE HITCH-HIKER
1954 PRIVATE HELL 36 by Don Siegel
Actress (selection)
1934 COME ON MARINES by Henry Hathaway
1935 PARIS IN SPRING by Lewis Milestone
PETER IBBETSON by Henry Hathaway
1936 ANYTHING GOES by Lewis Milestone
THE GAY DESPERADO by Robert Mamoulian
1937 ARTISTS & MODELS by Raoul Walsh
1939 THE ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES by Alfred L. Werker
1939THE LIGHT THAT FAILED by William A. Wellman
1940 THE DRIVE BY NIGHT by Raoul Walsh
1941 THE SEA WOLF by Michael Curtiz
1941 HIGH SIERRA by Raoul Walsh
1942 MOONTIDE by Archie Mayo
1943 THE HARD WAY by Vincent Sherman
1946 DEVOTION by Curtis Bernhardt
1947 THE MAN I LOVE by Raoul Walsh
1947 DEEP VALLEY by Jean Negulesco
1948 ROAD HOUSE by Jean Negulesco
1949 LUST FOR LOVE by S. Sylvan Simon
1950 WOMAN ON HIDING by Michel Gordon
1951 ON DANGEROUS GROUND by Nicholas Ray
1952 BEWARE, MY LOVELY by Harry Horner
1953 THE BIGAMIST by Ida Lupino
1953 JENNIFER by Joel Newton
1954 PRIVATE HELL 36 by Don Siegel
1955 THE BIG KNIFE by Robert Aldrich
1956 WHILE THE CITY SLEEPS by Fritz Lang
1972 JUNIOR BONNER by Sam Peckinpah
1976 THE DEVIL’S RAIN by Robert Fuest