Billy Wilder

Billy Wilder, a Jewish journalist and screenwriter in Berlin, fled the Nazis in 1933, reaching Hollywood in 1934 with almost no English; he learnt it partly by listening to the radio. Sharing a flat with fellow exile Peter Lorre, he broke in as a writer, then directed Double Indemnity, Sunset Boulevard, Some Like It Hot and The Apartment. His outsider's ear for American slang became his trademark.