Jerry Fairbanks

Gerald Bertram Fairbanks (November 1, 1904, San Francisco — June 21, 1995, Santa Barbara, California) was a producer and director in the Hollywood motion picture and television industry. Fairbanks survived the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, and began his career in film as a cameraman on silent movies such as John Barrymore's The Sea Beast (1926). This was followed by work on early sound productions such as Howard Hughes' film Hell's Angels (1930) in which he participated both as a biplane pilot and aerial cinematographer for the extensive World War I dogfight scenes.

His first foray into producing involved an innovative color series of theatrical short subjects for Universal Studios called Strange As It Seems (1930–1934). Based on the success of these productions, he was able to sell Paramount Pictures on three new series of short subjects entitled Unusual Occupations, Speaking of Animals, and Popular Science.

The latter series was produced with the cooperation of the editors of Popular Science magazine and ran from 1935 to 1949. Films in the Unusual Occupations and Popular Science series were made in Magnacolor and showcased a vast assortment of groundbreaking wonders from the world of science and industry.

In 1945, Fairbanks won the Academy Award for Best Short Subject, One Reel for Who's Who in Animal Land, and was nominated again in that category in 1948 for Moon Rockets. Overall, he won two Academy Awards and was nominated for a total of five such awards.

In the mid-1940s, Fairbanks was intrigued by television and became one of the first film producers to create filmed programs specifically for this new medium. His initial series was a 26-episode crime drama, Public Prosecutor, originally produced for NBC Television, but briefly shown on DuMont and in syndication instead.He broke new ground in television by inventing for NBC in 1947 the Multi-Cam multiple-camera setup of production, assisted by producer-director Frank Telford, which is still used by sitcoms today. This system allows a series of three or more cameras to be operated from different angles while remaining in sync with the sound track when turned off and on. Fairbanks recalled, "If you used three or four cameras, all running continuously, you were using up a tremendous amount of film. We developed a Multicam system where the soundtrack ran continuously. Cameras could be switched on and off at will, and the film from each camera could still be keyed to the soundtrack. That brought the cost way down."Desi Arnaz and Karl Freund are often cited as the inventors when producing I Love Lucy, but Arnaz himself gave credit to Fairbanks as the originator of this system. The only enhancement Arnaz made was to use 35 mm film instead of the 16 mm film which Fairbanks employed. Fairbanks, head of NBC's fledgling film department in 1947–1948, never filed a patent for his invention, and so lost out on fame for his invention. "We never pursued it because I was trying to help the industry. We were trying to promote the use of film for television. I was more interested in promoting the film industry than in getting an individual reputation for things."Fairbanks used the Zoomar Lens, now used almost universally in television to zoom from long shots to close-ups at will, without having to interrupt the telecasting to change lenses.

He also gave James Dean his very first opportunities on film, first in two Pepsi-Cola TV commercials and then as John the Apostle in the Father Peyton's Family Theater TV episode entitled "Hill Number One," broadcast on Easter Sunday, April 1, 1950.