Billy Wilder was born near the end of the nineteenth century in Austria-Hungary. His father was a successful businessman and his mother was a teacher. He left school at age sixteen, but later completed his education at the University of Vienna. In 1906 he directed his first film, "The Student Prince," and in 1910 directed "Sister Cornelia." During World War I, when he was twenty-one years old, he directed twenty-three films for the Austro-Hungarian army and by 1918, after directing hundreds of film shorts and features, he had directed over forty films
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He directed his first Hollywood film in 1929: “Ninotchka” starring Greta Garbo. This film won two Academy Awards and made him a household name. He directed such classics as “Sunset Boulevard” (1950), “The Apartment” (1960), “The Seven Year Itch” (1955), and “Some Like It Hot” (1959).
Although not producing any films himself since the 1950s, he continued to write books like “How to Make Money Selling Films” (1941), “To Be or Not to Be” (1942) and “Too Much Johnson” (1953). He passed away at ninety years old on November 16th of the same year of this book's publication.