From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Joseph Ruttenberg, A.S.C. (July 4, 1889 - May 1, 1983) was a Russian-born American photojournalist and cinematographer.

Ruttenberg was accomplished at winning accolades. At MGM, Ruttenberg was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Cinematography ten times, winning four. In addition, he won the 1954 Golden Globe Award for his camera work on the film Brigadoon. Born into a Jewish family in Berdychiv Zhytomyr oblast, Ukraine , Joseph Ruttenberg emigrated to the United States, arriving in Boston, Massachusetts on 7 January 1895. As a young man he went to work at the Boston Globe newspaper as a photojournalist but left in 1915 to accept a job with the Fox Film Corporation in New York City to train as a cinematographer. Two years later he was behind the camera for his first silent film, The Painted Madonna (1917), which marked the start of a remarkably successful career

In the late 1920s Ruttenberg went to work for Paramount Pictures in New York. His first talkie assignment was The Struggle (1931), D.W. Griffith's final film. Then in 1934 Ruttenberg signed on with MGM, moving to Hollywood where he was invited to join the American Society of Cinematographers.

Joseph Ruttenberg retired from MGM in 1968 and died in Los Angeles on May 1, 1983.