Alice Guy

Born in Saint-Mandé, France, she began her career in the late 19^th cen­tu­ry at Gau­mont, where she direct­ed hun­dreds of silent films at a time when cin­e­mat­ic lan­guage was still in its ear­ly stages. In 1907, she moved to the Unit­ed States and, in 1910, found­ed her own stu­dio near New York. As head of the Solax Film Com­pa­ny, she led the indus­try in pro­duc­tion and box-office suc­cess, work­ing with some of the biggest stars of the era. Her suc­cess was daz­zling but ulti­mate­ly could not with­stand the ris­ing dom­i­nance of Hol­ly­wood. Alice Guy returned to France pen­ni­less and spent the rest of her life striv­ing to restore recog­ni­tion for her work and her name.