In Remembrance: Daniel Petrie

     Daniel Petrie, the director of A Raisin In The Sun, has passed away Sunday August 22, 2004. He was 83.

     Born on November 26, 1920 in Glacial Bay, Nova Scotia, Canada, Petrie attended St. Francis Xavier University where he studied communications. He would complete a Masters Degree at New York's Columbia University before earning a PhD at Northwestern University.

     Petrie began his directing career in Chicago, where he directed episodes of the dramatic live anthology series Studio One. He would spend the rest of the 1950s directing for television series such as The Elgin Hour, The Alcoa Hour and Pursuit.

     Petrie's first film was 1960's The Bramble Bush. His next film was A Raisin In The Sun. Based on the successful stage play; the film starred Sidney Poitier as a young man struggling to make a better for life. The film was praised for its realistic depiction of life for inner city black families.

     Petrie worked in both television and film, often directing projects that dealt with social issues that had the potential to make his audiences uncomfortable. His 1966 film The Idol starred Michael Parks as a London-based sculptor with self-destructive tendencies. In 1981, he directed Paul Newman in the hard hitting, gritty cops and corruption picture Fort Apache, The Bronx.

     On television Petrie directed episodes of Ironside, Marcus Welby, M.D. and McMillan And Wife, among other series. The telefilm The Dollmaker (1984), starring Jane Fonda, dealt with women entering the work place for the first time while My Name Is Bill W. (1989) examined the life of the founder of Alcoholics Anonymous. He directed George C. Scott's last television appearance in a 1999 adaptation of the play Inherit The Wind.

     Petrie won two Genie Awards, the Canadian equivalent of an Academy Award, for writing and directing the semi-autobiographical The Bay Boy, a story about growing up in Nova Scotia, which featured Liev Ullmann and Keifer Sutherland.