Joseph Biroc

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Joseph Francis Biroc, ASC (February 12, 1903 – September 7, 1996) was an American cinematographer known for his work in film and television. Born in New York City, he began in film labs as a teen at Paragon Labs in Fort Lee, New Jersey, in 1918, then worked at Craftsman Labs in New York and Goldwyn Pictures in Culver City. He moved to Los Angeles in 1927, working for United Artists and then RKO as an assistant to top cinematographers. He contributed to early films like Cimarron, Swing Time, and Shall We Dance, often without screen credit.

During World War II, Biroc served in the U.S. Army Signal Corps and filmed the Liberation of Paris in 1944, as well as the Dachau concentration camp atrocities. After the war, he earned his first cinematography credit on It’s a Wonderful Life (1946). He shot Bwana Devil (1952), the first feature-length color 3-D film, and began a long collaboration with director Robert Aldrich on movies such as Attack (1956), Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964), The Flight of the Phoenix (1965), and The Longest Yard (1974).

Biroc also did early television work, including Adventures of Superman and Wonder Woman. He won the Academy Award for Best Cinematography for The Towering Inferno (1974), shared with Fred J. Koenekamp, and earned Primetime Emmy Awards for Brian’s Song and Casablanca. He continued to work into the 1980s and early 1990s, ending his career in 1989. He died in Woodland Hills, California, at age 93.