Joseph Sargent
About
Biography
Filmography
Family & Companions
Notes
Sargent was originally hired to direct "Coal Miner's Daughter" but Loretta Lynn clashed with him, particularly over the casting of Sissy Spacek and he was replaced on the project by Michael Apted.
Biography
The son of Italian immigrants, Joseph Sargent rose from blue collar New Jersey to Hollywood, but his best work as a director, the masterful action film "The Taking of Pelham One Two Three" (1974), retained a gritty, street-level quality. Born Giuseppe Danielle Sorgente on July 22, 1925 in Jersey City, NJ, he originally moved to California to find work as an actor. Though he did appear briefly in the classic "From Here To Eternity" (1953), Sargent soon found himself changing career paths, becoming a television director later in the 1950s. He spent over a decade as a journeyman director, amassing a solid credit list including episodes of hit series such as "Lassie" (CBS / Syndication 1954-1973), "The Man From U.N.C.L.E." (NBC 1964-68) and "Star Trek" (NBC 1966-69). In 1968, Sargent made the movie into film with a low-budget World War II drama starring Rod Taylor, "The Hell With Heroes" (1968). Dystopian science fiction thriller "Colossus: The Forbin Project" (1970) followed. A political drama, "The Man" (1972), was Sargent's next project: written by Rod Serling based on the novel by Irving Wallace, it starred James Earl Jones as a career politician who rises to the presidency. By this time it was clear that Sargent was effective in a number of different styles and genres. This was confirmed by his next two projects. "White Lightning" (1973) was a smash-'em-up chase movie starring Burt Reynolds as one of his most iconic characters, Gator McKlusky. This big hit was followed by Sargent's best-known film, the hard-edged, at times darkly comic thriller "The Taking of Pelham One Two Three" (1974), a heist film starring Walter Matthau as a hangdog NYPD lieutenant chasing a group of kidnappers who have taken a subway train hostage. Oddly, after that pair of critical and commercial successes, Sargent moved primarily into directing made for television movies. He only made three more theatrical features, the tepidly-received biopic "MacArthur" (1977), the low-budget horror anthology "Nightmares" (1983), and the legendary bomb "Jaws: The Revenge" (1987). Completed, from inception to editing, in less than nine months, "Jaws: The Revenge" is a perennial entry on "worst films of all time" lists. However, Sargent continued working steadily in television following that disaster, including high-profile made for TV movies such as the authorized biopic "The Karen Carpenter Story" (1989) and the HBO period drama "Something the Lord Made" (2004), for which he won the Directors Guild of America award. Sargent's final film was the family drama "Sweet Nothing In My Ear" (2008), starring Jeff Daniels and Marlee Matlin. Joseph Sargent died of heart disease on December 22, 2014 at the age of 89.
Filmography
Director (Feature Film)
Cast (Feature Film)
Producer (Feature Film)
Film Production - Main (Feature Film)
Director (Special)
Cast (Special)
Life Events
1957
Regular (as actor) on syndicated "Getaway Car" series
1966
Feature debut, "The Spy in the Green Hat" (compilation of episodes of "The Man From U.N.C.L.E."
1968
First non-compilation feature, "The Hell with Heroes"
1969
Directed pilot, "The Immortal" (ABC)
1970
Directed TV-movie "Tribes"
1971
Director-producer "Longstreet" TV series (ABC)
1972
Directed "The Man"
1973
Directed "The Marcus-Nelson Murders," TV-movie which became "Kojak" series
1974
Helmed "The Taking of Pelham One Two Three"
1977
Directed "MacArthur" starring Gregory Peck
1980
Directed "Playing for Time" Fania Fenelon story for CBS; "Amber Waves" for ABC
1981
Directed first miniseries, "The Manions of America"
1985
Directed "Love is Never Silent", one of first primetime dramas to employ sign language
1987
Returned to big screen with "Jaws -- The Revenge"
1989
Helmmed "Day One" and "The Karen Carpenter Story" for CBS
1990
Directed Walter Matthau in his TV-movie debut, "The Incident"
1992
Directed "Miss Rose White" for Hallmark Hall of Fame and NBC
1994
Helmed both "World War II: When Lions Roared" miniseries for ABC and "Abraham", a TNT miniseries
1995
Directed "Larry McMurtry's 'Streets of Laredo'" miniseries for CBS
1997
Directed the HBO movie "Miss Evers' Boys" based on the true story of the US Government's 1932 Tuskeegee Syphilis Experiments
1999
Won praise for his direction of the HBO drama "A Lesson Before Dying"
2000
Directed "For Love or Country: The Arturo Sandoval Story" starring Andy Garcia
2001
Directed "Bojangles" the biography of African-American William "Bojangles" Robinson (Gregory Hines)
2004
Directed the HBO movie "Something the Lord Made" which details the relationship between heart surgery pioneers Alfred Blalock (Alan Rickman) and Vivien Thomas (Mos Def)
2005
Directed Kenneth Branagh and Cynthia Nixon, as Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt in the HBO movie "Warm Springs," which chronicles the life of president Franklin Delano Roosevelt before he became president until his death
Videos
Movie Clip
Trailer
Family
Companions
Bibliography
Notes
Sargent was originally hired to direct "Coal Miner's Daughter" but Loretta Lynn clashed with him, particularly over the casting of Sissy Spacek and he was replaced on the project by Michael Apted.
