The director of the classic American thriller movie Jaws, Steven Spielberg, is one of the biggest names in Hollywood. His box-office films earned him two Academy Awards for Best Director and brought in a massive amount of fortune in his life.
Born on December 18, 1946, Spielberg discovered his love for film-making as early as 12 years old. He made his very first home project playing with his favorite toy Lionel trains, and pursued creating amateur adventure films during his adolescent years.
His first award for film-making was a photography merit Boy Scout’s badge when young Spielberg told the scoutmaster that his dad’s camera was broken so he offered to make a story about the broken lens. The thirteen-year-old young director also triumphed in his 40-minute war film entitled Escape to Nowhere, and the rest is history…
When his family moved to California, he worked as an intern at Universal Studios and got a chance to make a short movie project. His 26-minute 35 mm film Amblin caught Universal Studio’s vice president Sidney Sheinberg ’s attention, and immediately offered him a seven-year contract.
Spielberg’s short film won several awards and made him the youngest director to sign a long-term deal with a prominent Hollywood studio.
The television series Night Gallery was his first professional directing project at the age of twenty-one. At first, everyone was hesitant about his talent, but he surprised them with his brilliant ideas and intuitive inspirations. The cast of Night Gallery was very grateful to have him as their director and called him a young genius.
The studio then offered him film projects such as Duel, Something Evil, and The Sugarland Express.
All throughout his five-decade film career, he directed and produced over one hundred feature films that grossed more than $25 billion. He co-founded the movie production studio DreamWorks together with Jeffrey Katzenberg and David Geffen in 1994. He also co-founded another film production company Amblin Entertainment alongside Kathleen Kennedy and Frank Marshall in 1981.
Most of his salary came from being a consultant for Universal Studios, box-office films, and other business ventures made him one of the richest Hollywood filmmakers. He is married to Kate Capshaw in 1991 and raised seven children together including the ones from their previous marriages. Some of their children made appearances in the film industry as well, while some pursued a career in music.
Steven Spielberg other notable projects include E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Jurassic Park, and Close Encounters of the Third Kind.
