Early Life and Career
Smith was born Peter Schmidt in New York City. He began his career as an aide for a vaudeville performers union. Smith then worked as an editor and critic for a trade magazine before becoming a press agent. By 1915 he was doing movie publicity for Bosworth, Inc., followed by the Oliver Morosco Photoplay Co., Artcraft Pictures Corporation, and Famous Players-Lasky. He was one of the founding members of the Associated Motion Picture Advertisers.
In 1925, Smith was hired as the head of publicity for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer by Louis B. Mayer. He was later recruited to overdub the actions of trained dogs in the studio's Dogville Comedies. Smith would go on to narrate the studio's sports newsreels; he would embellish the action by running certain scenes in reverse, or adding his own commentary.
Read more about this topic: Pete Smith (film Producer)
Famous quotes containing the words early, life and/or career:
“Love is the hardest thing in the world to write about. So simple. Youve got to catch it through details, like the early morning sunlight hitting the gray tin of the rain spout in front of her house. The ringing of a telephone that sounds like Beethovens Pastoral. A letter scribbled on her office stationery that you carry around in your pocket because it smells of all the lilacs in Ohio.”
—Billy Wilder (b. 1906)
“The fate of the poor shepherd, who, blinded and lost in the snow-storm, perishes in a drift within a few feet of his cottage door, is an emblem of the state of man. On the brink of the waters of life and truth, we are miserably dying.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (18031882)
“In time your relatives will come to accept the idea that a career is as important to you as your family. Of course, in time the polar ice cap will melt.”
—Barbara Dale (b. 1940)