Samuel Grosvenor Wood (1883–1949) was a former real estate broker who, in the silent days of American cinema, became a movie director—and, by the advent of sound, a prominent filmmaker and one of the most trusted and technically gifted of all Hollywood veterans.
He appeared as an actor in a few two-reelers in 1908 under the name Chad Applegate, and in 1915 became an assistant director to C. B. DeMille. Late in 1919 he was promoted to director at Paramount. In the 1920s he handled many of Gloria Swanson’s films (including some parts of the ill-fated Queen Kelly). He developed a reputation as a reliable craftsman who could turn mediocre material into acceptable entertainment. Unfortunately, most of his silent films are lost or inaccessible. He solidified his position in the 1930s when, at MGM, he directed—along with a large number of routine productions—such diverse films as the superb Marx Brothers comedies A Night at the Opera and A Day at the Races.
Goodbye, Mr. Chips was another of his favored films from this period. He even directed a few scenes of Gone With the Wind after George Cukor was fired by producer Selznick. He reached the peak of his craft toward the end of his career, in the 1940s, when he turned out with sure-handed skill such films as Our Town, For Whom the Bell Tolls, The Pride of the Yankees, Command Decision, and the excellent drama Kings Row. It was also Wood who directed Ginger Rogers to her Oscar-winning performance in Kitty Foyle.
