The Life and Works of Frank "Shug" Shugrue
For Pete's Sake
Dir. Peter Yates
Universal, 1974
Prod date : 24 Sep - early Dec 1973
The Sting
Dir. George Roy Hill
Universal, 1973
Prod date : 22 Jan - mid Apr 1973
The Way We Were
Dir. Sydney Pollack
Columbia, 1973
Prod date : mid Sep - early Dec 1972
Up The Sandbox
Dir. Irvin Kershner
First Artists Prod. Co., 1972
Prod date : early Mar - late Jun 1972
Portraits of Ava Gardner
ca. January 1972
During the filming of Judge Roy Bean
© Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean
Dir. John Huston
First Artists Production Co., 1973
Prod date : ended early Jan 1972
Sometimes A Great Notion
Dir. Paul Newman - Universal, 1971
Prod date : 22 Jun 1970 - 29 Jul 1970
11 Aug - early Oct 1970
Soldier Blue
Dir. Ralph Nelson
Joseph E. Levine - Avco Embassy, 1970
Prod date : began 28 Oct 1969
Norwood
Dir. Jack Haley Jr.
Paramount, 1970
Prod date : began 3 July 1969
Rosemary’s Baby
Dir. Roman Polanski
William Castle Enterprises, 1968
Prod date : 21 Aug - mid Dec 1967
The Graduate
Dir. Mike Nichols
Lawrence Turman Inc., 1967
Prod date : 24 Apr - 25 Aug 1967
Wait Until Dark
Dir. Terence Young
Warner Bros., 1967
Prod date : 15 Jan - 7 Apr 1967
Torn Curtain
Dir. Alfred Hitchcock
Universal, 1966
Prod date : 18 Oct 1965 - 16 Feb 1966
Portrait of John Huston
and Paul Kohner
Unknown location
ca. 1965
Blindfold
Dir. Philip Dunne
Universal, 1966
Prod date : early Feb. 1965
McHale's Navy
Dir. Edward J. Montagne
Universal, 1964
Prod date : 9 Mar - 31 Mar 1964
Wild Seed
Dir. Brian G. Hutton
Pennebaker Inc. - Universal, 1965
Prod date : began 4 Feb 1964
Looking For Love
Dir. Don Weiss
MGM, 1964
Prod date : 14 Oct - late Nov 1963
Viva Las Vegas
Dir. George Sidney
MGM, 1964
Prod date : 15 Jul - 16 Sep 1963
Advance to the Rear
Dir. George Marshall
MGM, 1964
Prod date : Jul - Aug 1963
© James Christensen / Coyotechrist
Two Weeks in Another Town
Dir. Vincente Minnelli
MGM, 1962
Prod date : 8 Oct - Dec 1961
Photos of Richard Chamberlain
Dated 23 Feb 1961
Casting for: A Thunder of Drums (?)
Portraits of Gina Lollobrigida
ca. 1960
Go Naked in the World
Dir. Ranald MacDougall
MGM, 1960
Prod date : 15 Feb - 7 Mar | 14 Apr - 3 Jun | re-shooting mid Jul 1960
All the Fine Young Cannibals
Dir. Michael Anderson
MGM, 1960
Prod date : 3 Nov - mid Dec 1959
The Subterraneans
Dir. Ranald MacDougall
MGM, 1960
Prod date : 24 Aug - mid Oct 1959
On The Beach
Dir. Stanley Kramer
United Artists, 1959
Prod date : mid. Jan - 27 Mar 1959
The Time Machine
Dir. George Pal
MGM., 1960
Prod date : late May - early July 1959
The High Cost of Loving
Dir. José Ferrer
MGM, 1958
Prod date : 16 Sep - mid oct 1957
Until They Sail
Dir. Robert Wise
MGM, 1957
Prod date : mid Mar - early May 1957
Raintree County
Dir. Edward Dmytryk - MGM, 1957
Prod date : early Apr - 13 May
24 Jul - 16 Oct 1956
Gaby
Dir. Curtis Bernhardt
MGM, 1956
Prod. date: early Sept - late Oct 1955
Forbidden Planet
Dir. Fred M. Wilcox
MGM, 1956
Prod date : 18 Apr - late May 1955
It's Always Fair Weather
Dir. Gene Kelly, Stanley Donen
MGM, 1955
Prod date : 13 Oct 1954 - early May 1955
Jupiter's Darling
Dir. George Sidney - MGM, 1955
Prod date : 17 May - early Aug 1954
Seven Brides for Seven Brothers
Dir. Stanley Donen
MGM, 1954
Prod date : 30 Nov 1953 - early Feb 1954
25th Academy Awards
Backstage Ceremony Photographs
March 9, 1952
© Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
Young Bess
Dir. George Sidney
MGM, 1953
Prod. date: 2 Oct - 19 Nov 1952
All The Brothers Were Valiant
Dir. Richard Thorpe
MGM, 1953
Prod. date: 8 Jan - early Mar 1953
Scandal At Scourie
Dir. Jean Negulesco
MGM, 1953
Prod. date: 14 Jul - mid Aug 1952
The King's Thief
Dir. Robert Z. Leonard
MGM, 1955
Prod. date: 27 Dec 1954 - mid Feb 1955
© Michael Shugrue
Everything I Have is Yours
Dir. Robert Z. Leonard
MGM, 1952
Prod date : mid Feb - mid Mar 1952
Because You're Mine
Dir. Alexander Hall - MGM, 1952
Prod date : early Dec 1951 - mid Feb 1952
retakes began 8 May 1952
Scaramouche
Dir. George Sidney
MGM, 1952
Prod. date: 24 Aug - late Nov 1951
Singin' in the Rain
Dir. Gene Kelly, Stanley Donen
MGM, 1952
Prod. date: 15 Jun - 21 Nov 1951
retakes ended 26 Dec 1951
The Law and The Lady
Dir. Edwin H. Knopf
MGM, 1951
Prod date : 29 Jan - early Mar 1951
An American in Paris
Dir. Vincente Minnelli
MGM, 1951
Prod. date: 1 Aug 1950 - 8 Jan 1951
retakes began 2 Apr 1951
Two Weeks With Love
Dir. Roy Rowland
MGM, 1950
Prod date : 23 Mar - late May 1950
The Toast of New Orleans
Dir. Norman Taurog
MGM, 1950
Prod date : late Dec 1949 - early Mar 1950
Duchess of Idaho
Dir. Robert Z. Leonard
MGM, 1950
Prod date : mid Oct - early Dec 1949
The Big Hangover
Dir. Norman Krasna
MGM, 1950
Prod date : early Aug - late Sep 1949
Black Hand
Dir. Richard Thorpe
MGM, 1950
Prod date : late Jul - late Aug 1949
On The Town
Dir. Gene Kelly, Stanley Donen
MGM, 1950
Prod date : late Mar - mid Jul 1949
Neptune's Daughter
Dir. Edward Buzzell - MGM, 1949
Prod date : late Oct 1948 - mid Jan 1949;
additional scenes late Feb 1949
Little Women
Dir. Melvyn LeRoy
MGM, 1949
Prod. date: 29 Jun - late Sep 1948
Big City
Dir. Norman Taurog - MGM, 1948
Prod date : 5 Oct - early Dec 1947
retakes completed 30 Dec 1947
Luxury Liner
Dir. Laslo Benedek
MGM, 1948
Prod date : early Aug - late Sep 1947
The Kissing Bandit
Dir. Richard Whorf - MGM, 1949
Prod date : mid May - early Aug 1947
added scenes began mid Mar 1948
Tree Daring Daughters
Dir. Fred M. Wilcox
MGM, 1948
Prod date : Nov 1946 - late Jan 1947
It is difficult to find information on a still photographer working under contract with the big Hollywood production companies at the time when James Frank Shugrue plied his trade. The known part of his career lasted nearly thirty years, from the mid-1940s to the early 1970s. As with his colleagues, he was hardly ever mentioned in the credits on the screen and today the thousands of photos he took are rarely credited to his name.
Frank Shugrue was born in Alameda (California) on December 11, 1910, to Thomas F. and Isabelle Shugrue. In the late 1920's we find him installed with his family in Santa Monica and playing football at the age of 19 in the University team. Living with them, there was also a certain related John T. Shugrue who is cited as a "studio worker". Maybe with the help of Tom, his father, who was already in the place at the MGM Studios as an electrician, or John, Frank was hired by the company in 1935 as a member of the recently created Front Office Crew, which was a group of young men in charge of the protection and care of the movie stars.
Ten years after this first experience, we find Frank credited as the first camera assistant on Victor Fleming's Adventure for MGM in 1945. He might have worked longer in the camera department than this unique mention tells, but we don't know more about that. Soon after, he started out a new career as a still photographer. Frank wasn't the only one in this role at MGM Studios, he was one of the many other "Still Men" who worked for the company: Virgil Apger, Kenny Bell, Milton Brown, Eric Carpenter, Otto Dyar, Bud Graybill, Jerry Hester, Eddie Hubbell, Bert Lynch, James Manatt, and others. Their job consisted mostly to take production shots and scene stills but they were also asked to make promotional pictures of MGM's stars which were reproduced in magazines.
Frank worked for about 20 years for the MGM Studios exclusively. But from the mid-1960s, his employers became more varied: Universal, Warner, Paramount in addition to other independent producers. During his career, he rubbed shoulders with great directors and took photos of films that have remained famous, we let you discover them in the timeline below. You will notice that the filming periods sometimes overlap because Frank could take, for example, sets or wardrobe tests photos for a few days and then be called upon the following week on another film shooting to take scene stills.
There are very few sources that list the movies he's worked on and they don't all say the same thing. By combining the lists of A.F.I., B.F.I., I.M.Db. and TCM with some rare other sources (the A.M.P.A.S. Collections, the Swedish Film Database, the Motion Picture Production Encyclopedia...), we arrive at a total of forty films or so with many periods where information is missing, sometimes for nearly two years during which we know nothing of the films in which he participated. It should be noted that for more than ten films, among which are our favorites, Forbidden Planet (1955) and The Time Machine (1959), absolutely no source refers to the presence of Frank Shugrue: it is only the letters "s,h,u,g" appearing on some rare photographs made for set references, makeup or wardrobe tests that attest to his participation in their shooting. So the lists cited above are very incomplete and Frank surely worked on a lot of other films during all the periods where it looks like he didn't do anything at all.
Frank Shugrue in San Francisco, leafing through the Haight Ashbury Tribune, an underground hippie publication, during the filming of The Graduate in 1967 (photo presented courtesy of Mrs. Nicole Scalise).
Cast and crew members on the filming of Until They Sail (1957). Identified from left: Jean Simmons, director of photography Joseph Ruttenberg stands behind Piper Laurie, and director Robert Wise (far right). Production photo (detail) by Frank Shugrue.
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The Life and Works
of Frank "Shug" Shugrue
Cast and crew members on the filming of Until They Sail (1957). Identified from left: Jean Simmons, director of photography Joseph Ruttenberg behind Piper Laurie, and director Robert Wise (far right). Production photo (detail).
Cast and crew members on the filming of Until They Sail (1957). Identified from left: Jean Simmons, director of photography Joseph Ruttenberg behind Piper Laurie, and director Robert Wise (far right). Production photo (detail).
The Life and Works
of Frank Shugrue