Best Art Direction, 1943

Awards presented March 2, 1944
The nominees were ... 
(Black-and-White)
(Color)
... when they should have been ... 
(Black-and-White) 
And the Oscar went to ... 
(Black-and-White) 
The Song of Bernadette. Art Direction: James Basevi, William Darling; Interior Decoration: Thomas Little. 

This was the only Oscar for Basevi, who began his set design career in 1924 at MGM, then moved to United Artists before landing at 20th Century-Fox in 1941. He was loaned to David O. Selznick in 1945 for Spellbound, on which he translated Salvador Dalí's designs into sets for the dream sequences. This was the second of Darling's three Oscars. Born in Hungary, he adopted his wife's maiden name as a surname in the United States. He went to work for Fox in 1922, and remained with the company when it merged to become 20th Century-Fox. Little, head of the 20th Century-Fox set decorating department, received six Oscars. 

(Color) 


Claude Rains and Susanna Foster
While the 1943 Phantom is mostly a camp-fest, it's undeniably a gorgeously designed one. This was the only Oscar for Goodman out of four nominations; he began his career in 1932 at Paramount, and moved to Universal in 1940. Golitzen was the more famous name, earning fourteen nominations with three wins, of which this was the first. He worked at first primarily with the major independent producers, Samuel Goldwyn and Walter Wanger, but joined Universal, where he became the chief art director in 1954, a job that he held for the next twenty years. Gausman worked closely with Golitzen, winning both of his Oscars on films on which they collaborated. This was the sole Oscar for Webb, also a frequent collaborator with the other three men.  


Nelson Eddy in Phantom of the Opera 



... when it should have gone to ... 
(Black-and-White) 
Cabin in the Sky. Art Direction: Cedric Gibbons, Leonid Vasian; Interior Decoration: Edwin B. Willis, Hugh Hunt.

Little Joe (Eddie "Rochester" Anderson) is torn between his wife, Petunia (Ethel Waters), and the glamorous singer Georgia Brown (Lena Horne). When he's wounded in a nightclub fight a battle for his soul begins between Lucifer (Rex Ingram) and the General (Kenneth Spencer). He's saved by Petunia's devotion. The racial stereotypes in director Vincente Minnelli's first film are uncomfortable today, though MGM went out of its way to avoid the controversy that had been generated by its 1936 film of The Green Pastures, consulting with members of Hollywood's black community. Say what you will about the story and the characters, the performances are wonderful. In addition to the principals the cast includes Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, and the original Sportin' Life of Porgy and Bess, John Bubbles. The look of Cabin in the Sky is probably chiefly attributable to Minnelli, who began his career as a theatrical costume and set designer before becoming a stage director. He didn't have a hand in the original Broadway production, which was directed by Albert Lewis and staged by George Balanchine, but the sets for the film version are deliberately theatrical. As usual with MGM productions, Gibbons and Willis are nominated because they were department heads. Vasian, one of the studio's second-string designers, never received an Oscar nomination. Hunt, however, won for Julius Caesar and Ben-Hur, and was nominated eleven more times. 
The General sets Petunia and Joe off on the starway to heaven
Joe is tempted by Georgia Brown as the General and Lucifer look on
A screen test of the cabin set
Georgia's dressing room

Interior of the cabin 

The cabin's bedroom
     
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