Exploring the work of Dorothy Arzner as a film-making teacher in southern California

Oct 15, 2026

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Dorothy Arzner is remembered for directing feature films in Hollywood’s golden age, yet her lesser-known contribution lies in film-making education in southern California. During major shifts in how U.S. filmmakers learned their craft, she taught at institutions as students moved from studio apprenticeship to college coursework. After early work with Realart Pictures and the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps, the article examines her teaching at the Pasadena Playhouse College of Theatre Arts and UCLA, combining assessments of her pedagogy with accounts from former students and colleagues.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryLiterature

FormatPDF

Pages12

Reading Time18 min

AccessFree to download

Abstract

Dorothy Arzner’s teaching career

Institutions and early instructional work

Pedagogical context and film education transition

From studio apprenticeship to college courses

Students and legacy

Film Education Journal Article Exploring the work of Dorothy Arzner as a film-making teacher in southern California Martin F. Norden1,* 1 Professor, Department of Communication, University of Massachusetts Amherst, USA *Correspondence: [norden@comm. umass.edu](norden@comm. umass.edu) Submission date: 14 February 2022; Acceptance date: 9 May 2022; Publication date: 17 November 2022 How to cite Norden, M. F. (2022)‘Exploring the work of Dorothy Arzner as a film-making teacher in southern California’. Film Education Journal, 5 (2), 68–79 . DOI: [https://doi.org/10.14324/FEJ.05.2.01](https://doi.org/10.14324/FEJ.05.2.01) . Peer review This article has been peer-reviewed through the journal’s standard double-anonymous peer review, where both the reviewers and authors are anonymised during review. Copyright 2022, Martin F. Norden. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Licence (CC BY) 4.0 [https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited • DOI: [https://doi.org/10.14324/FEJ.05.2.01](https://doi.org/10.14324/FEJ.05.2.01) . Open access Film Education Journal is a peer-reviewed open-access journal. Abstract Dorothy Arzner is best remembered as one of the exceptionally few women to direct feature films during Hollywood’s ‘golden age’. One of the lesser known dimensions of her career is her work as a film-making teacher in southern California during a time of great change in the ways that US-based film-makers learnt their craft. During the 1950s and 1960s, students were no longer limited to on-thejob studio training, as Arzner had been in her prime; instead, they were learning how to make films via college and university coursework, and Arzner was unquestionably a key player in this educational transition. After examining her preliminary instructional work with Realart Pictures and the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps, this article explores Arzner’s teaching experiences at the Pasadena Playhouse College of Theatre Arts and the University of California Los Angeles. It combines her assessments of her pedagogical practices with commentary from former students and colleagues to provide a composite portrait of this pivotal film-maker turned educator. Keywords Dorothy Arzner; Francis Ford Coppola; film-making education; Pasadena Playhouse; student film-making; UCLA; Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps Film Education Journal [https://doi.org/10.14324/FEJ.05.2.01](https://doi.org/10.14324/FEJ.05.2.01) Exploring the work of Dorothy Arzner as a film-making teacher in southern California 69 Dorothy Arzner (Figure 1) is best remembered as one of the exceptionally few women to direct feature films in Hollywood during the American studio system’s ‘golden age’. Beginning her film career in 1919 as a script typist for Famous Players-Lasky, later known as Paramount Pictures, Arzner rose through the ranks to become a script continuity supervisor (a ‘script clerk’ in the parlance of the day), film editor and screenwriter during the 1920s, before directing her first film, Fashions for Women, in 1927. She prospered as a Hollywood director through the 1930s, before winding down that phase of her career in the early 1940s. One of the lesser known aspects of Arzner’s professional life is her work as a film-making teacher. After several preliminary instructional experiences with Realart Pictures Corporation and the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps in southern California, Arzner taught film production at the collegiate level from the early 1950s to the mid-1960s. The principal discussions of her life and career barely mention her pedagogical work at the Pasadena Playhouse College of Theatre Arts and the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) (Mayne, 1994; Peary and Kay, 1974) . This aspect of Arzner’s wor

FAQs

Why is Dorothy Arzner significant beyond her film directing career?

The document highlights her work as a film-making teacher in southern California during a period of major change in U.S. film education.

What educational transition does the article focus on?

It describes the shift in the 1950s and 1960s from studio apprenticeship to learning film craft through college and university coursework.

Which institutions and groups does the article discuss regarding Arzner’s teaching?

It examines her experiences at the Pasadena Playhouse College of Theatre Arts and UCLA, following preliminary instructional work with Realart Pictures and the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps.

Oct 15, 2026

Upload by Finn