Hollywood's Architect: The Paul R. Williams Story (2020)

(0) based on 0 votes
Nicknamed “Architect to the Stars,” African American architect Paul R. Williams had an incredible life. Orphaned at the age of four, Williams grew up to build mansions for movie stars and millionaires in Southern California. From the early 1920s until his retirement 50 years later, Williams was one of the most successful architects in the country. His clients included Frank Sinatra, Cary Grant, Barbara Stanwyck, William Holden, Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz. His name is associated with icons like the Beverly Hills Hotel, the original MCA Headquarters Building and LAX Airport. But at the height of his career Paul Williams wasn’t always welcome in the restaurants and hotels he designed or the neighborhoods where he built homes, because of his race. “Hollywood’s Architect: The Paul R. Williams Story” tells the compelling, but little known story, of how he used talent and perseverance to beat the odds and create a body of work that can be found from coast to coast.
Directors
Release Date
Feb 06, 2020
Runtime
00h 57m
Genre
Available in streaming on

Nicknamed “Architect to the Stars,” African American architect Paul R. Williams had an incredible life. Orphaned at the age of four, Williams grew up to build mansions for movie stars and millionaires in Southern California. From the early 1920s until his retirement 50 years later, Williams was one of the most successful architects in the country. His clients included Frank Sinatra, Cary Grant, Barbara Stanwyck, William Holden, Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz. His name is associated with icons like the Beverly Hills Hotel, the original MCA Headquarters Building and LAX Airport. But at the height of his career Paul Williams wasn’t always welcome in the restaurants and hotels he designed or the neighborhoods where he built homes, because of his race. “Hollywood’s Architect: The Paul R. Williams Story” tells the compelling, but little known story, of how he used talent and perseverance to beat the odds and create a body of work that can be found from coast to coast.

Movies like Hollywood's Architect: The Paul R. Williams Story

Worlds largest rocket builder

It’s October 10 2020 and Kim Jong-un presents the largest mobile rocket on Earth. Jippe Liefbroer, Interaction Design student, sees the rocket and thinks: it can be bigger. For his graduation project he built 'Kimmi's worst nightmare', a 31 meter long rocket. That is 1 meter longer than Kim Jung-un's.
Search similar movies
8.3
Worlds+largest+rocket+builder
Worlds largest rocket builder

2022

Search similar movies
Tadao Ando: Samurai Architect

Tadao Ando (b.1941) is a world-renowned architect, and a recipient of the Pritzker Architecture Prize. His calm, minimalist architecture with elegant concrete designs reflects the Zen principle of simplicity. In the film he reveals the experience a building should evoke, as he discusses a number of iconic designs, such as The Row House and The Church of Light.
Search similar movies
Tadao+Ando%3A+Samurai+Architect
Tadao Ando: Samurai Architect

2019

Search similar movies
Geoff McFetridge: Drawing a Life

Deeply thoughtful and illuminating, DRAWING A LIFE reveals the details of artist Geoff McFetridge’s life and work while delving further into the universal questions of what makes a fulfilling life and how to live with intention in the limited time we all have.
Search similar movies
8.0
Geoff+McFetridge%3A+Drawing+a+Life
Geoff McFetridge: Drawing a Life

2023

Search similar movies
Orsay, les grandes métamorphoses

Inaugurated in 1986 by François Mitterrand, a link between the Louvre and Pompidou, Orsay houses the largest collection of Impressionist art in the world. Project after project, the museum has been transformed to modernize and welcome more visitors, while preserving its historic character. Challenges taken up with each new project.
Search similar movies
8.0
Orsay%2C+les+grandes+m%C3%A9tamorphoses
Orsay, les grandes métamorphoses

2020

Search similar movies
Lewerentz Divine Darkness

A cultural-historical portrait of the renowned and enigmatic architect Sigurd Lewerentz, who rarely allowed himself to be captured on film.
Search similar movies
Lewerentz+Divine+Darkness
Lewerentz Divine Darkness

2024

Search similar movies
Years of Construction

Demolition of the old and building of the new Kunsthalle in Mannheim in the years 2013 to 2018.
Search similar movies
6.6
Years+of+Construction
Years of Construction

2019

Search similar movies
Berlin Babylon

A documentary focusing on the rebuilding projects in Berlin after the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Search similar movies
7.6
Berlin+Babylon
Berlin Babylon

2001

Search similar movies
Ad Astra

A visual journey through Norwegian modernist church architecture. A short documentary film that pays tribute to the Norwegian church and post-war postmodernist architects for its daring reform of the 50-70's innovative church building. Raw concrete and cold clean lines in a functionalist style were in line with society's development, but in stark contrast to what the church had previously represented. The film portrays 25 of these churches from all over the country
Search similar movies
Ad+Astra
The Amateur

The memory of Piero Portaluppi, a Milanese architect who reached the peak of his fame during the 20 years of the Fascist regime, comes back to life, both through the rediscovery of his work today and in a previously unpublished film diary in 16 mm, shot and edited throughout his lifetime. A man of great charm and power, Portaluppi lived through a grandiose but tragic era with ironic detachment, as if dancing across things as he created beauty. History marches on implacably, radically transforming the arena in which the eclectic artist and his large family lived and worked.
Search similar movies
8.0
The+Amateur
The Amateur

2016

Search similar movies
Tokyo Ride

Revisiting the genre of the road movie in a very diaristic and personal way, the film takes us on board architect Ryue Nishizawa’s vintage Alfa Romeo (Giulia) for a day long wandering in the streets of Tokyo.
Search similar movies
10.0
Tokyo+Ride
Tokyo Ride

2020

Search similar movies
The Living Stones of Sacsayhuamán

Sacsayhuamán, an ancient citadel amidst the Peruvian Andes, is an architectural marvel. It was built more than 900 years ago, and no living person knows how such large rocks were fitted so perfectly into walls. This documentary takes us on a tour of Sacsayhuamán, offering a brief history of the site, and clues that may help to its understand how it was made. It was edited from photos and video taken in July 2012, when Russian geophysicists conducted soil research there, at the request of Peru's Ministry of Culture.
Search similar movies
The+Living+Stones+of+Sacsayhuam%C3%A1n
The Living Stones of Sacsayhuamán

2014

Search similar movies
Neutra: Survival Through Design

This insightful documentary feature from PJ Letofsky serves as a profile of iconic Austrian-American Architect Richard Neutra, whose work and legacy have helped shape the modern understanding of design, architecture and the interconnected fabric of nature. Today, Richard's legacy lives on through his son, Dion, who has taken up his father's mantle after nearly three-decades under his mentorship.
Search similar movies
Neutra%3A+Survival+Through+Design
Neutra: Survival Through Design

2019

Search similar movies
Wiener Barock - Der Architekt dreier Kaiser

Plot unavailable
Search similar movies
9.0
Wiener+Barock+-+Der+Architekt+dreier+Kaiser
Wiener Barock - Der Architekt dreier Kaiser

2024

Search similar movies
Derrière les murs de la Cité interdite

Plot unavailable
Search similar movies
8.0
Derri%C3%A8re+les+murs+de+la+Cit%C3%A9+interdite
Derrière les murs de la Cité interdite

2024

Search similar movies
De Gaulle bâtisseur

Plot unavailable
Search similar movies
9.0
De+Gaulle+b%C3%A2tisseur
De Gaulle bâtisseur

2020

Search similar movies
Arles, au cœur de la cité antique

Plot unavailable
Search similar movies
7.0
Arles%2C+au+c%C5%93ur+de+la+cit%C3%A9+antique
Arles, au cœur de la cité antique

2021

Search similar movies
Petra: Secrets of the Ancient Builders

In the heart of the Jordanian desert, the ancient city of Petra is full of mysteries. How was this architectural wonder created over 2,000 years ago? The technical prowess of Petra, an ancient city in southern Jordan, which was a wonder in the middle of the desert.
Search similar movies
8.0
Petra%3A+Secrets+of+the+Ancient+Builders
Petra: Secrets of the Ancient Builders

2019

Search similar movies
Antonio Gaudí

Catalan architect Antonio Gaudí (1852-1926) designed some of the world's most astonishing buildings, interiors, and parks; Japanese director Hiroshi Teshigahara constructed some of the most aesthetically audacious films ever made. With camera work as bold and sensual as the curves of his subject's organic structures, Teshigahara immortalizes Gaudí on film.
Search similar movies
7.2
Antonio+Gaud%C3%AD
Antonio Gaudí

1984

Search similar movies
In Residence: Ricardo Bofill

There are houses, and then there’s Ricardo Bofill’s house: a brutalist former cement factory of epic proportions on the outskirts of Barcelona, Spain. A grandiose monument to industrial architecture in the Catalonian town of Sant Just Desvern, La Fabrica is a poetic and personal space that redefines the notion of the conventional home. “Nowadays we want everyone who comes through our door to feel comfortable, but that's not Bofill’s idea here,” says filmmaker Albert Moya, who directed latest installment of In Residence. “It goes much further, you connect with the space in a more spiritual way.” Rising above lush gardens that mask the grounds’ unglamorous roots, the eight remaining silos that once hosted an endless stream of workmen and heavy machinery now house both Bofill’s private life, and his award-winning architecture and urban design practice.
Search similar movies
10.0
In+Residence%3A+Ricardo+Bofill
In Residence: Ricardo Bofill

2014

Search similar movies
Barcelone vu par Ricardo Bofill

A native of the capital of Catalonia, the architect-urban planner, to whom we owe the Saint-Honoré market in Paris and the Donnelley Building in Chicago, speaks of Barcelona with infectious passion. "It's a unique city, difficult to understand with conventional diagrams, he explains, criss-crossing the main arteries of the city". It is an unfinished city, constantly changing, where everything has the charm of the unfinished". With a sharp eye, Ricardo Bofill observes and comments on volumes and scrolls. Standing, in the nave of the Sagrada Familia, arms outstretched, it pivots on itself as if to take in space. "You have to have your eyes wide open, move quietly, and at the same time remember what's behind. This is how we have the sense of space. Otherwise this art does not exist."
Search similar movies
10.0
Barcelone+vu+par+Ricardo+Bofill
Barcelone vu par Ricardo Bofill

2003

Search similar movies
Making Dust

Making Dust is an essay film, a portrait of the demolition of Ireland's second largest Catholic Church, the Church of the Annunciation in Finglas West, Dublin. Understanding this moment as a 'rupture', the film maps an essay by architectural historian Ellen Rowley on to documentation of the building's dismantling. Featuring oral interviews recorded at the site of the demolition and in a nearby hairdressers, the film invites viewers to pause and reflect on this ending alongside the community of the building. The film is informed by Ultimology, and invites its audience to think about the life cycles of buildings and materials, how we mourn, what is sacred, how we gather, what we value and issues of sustainability in architecture.
Search similar movies
Making+Dust
Making Dust

2023

Search similar movies
Coast Modern

A core group of architects embraced the West Coast from Vancouver to LA with its particular geography and values and left behind a legacy of inspired dwellings. Today, architects celebrate the influence established by their predecessors.
Search similar movies
8.0
Coast+Modern
Coast Modern

2012

Search similar movies