13 Facts About Stuart Legg

Stuart Legg was a pioneering English documentary filmmaker.

Francis Stuart Legg was one of three children born to Ethel Green Legg and Arthur Legg, a solicitor.

Stuart Legg attended Marlborough College and St John's College, Cambridge, where he read the mechanical sciences tripos.

Stuart Legg saw a lack of public engagement and knowledge of events as contributing to threats to democracy, and saw documentary films as an art-form which could keep the public informed and involved.

Stuart Legg founded the Documentary Film Movement, and recruited several young filmmakers, including Legg.

Stuart Legg would stay with the GPO Film Unit until 1937, when he replaced Paul Rotha as head of the Strand Film Company.

Stuart Legg brought Legg to Canada to make two films whose purpose was to promote the Dominion-Provincial Youth Training Program.

Stuart Legg decided to stay in Canada, and became Director of Production for the Canadian Government Motion Picture Bureau.

Stuart Legg resigned from the NFB and convinced Legg to join him in New York, where he was able to reach a production deal with Universal Pictures.

Grierson's reputation was temporarily damaged when he was caught up in the Gouzenko Affair and accused of being a spy; the deal with Universal was cancelled and, in 1946, Stuart Legg returned to England.

In 1940 the GPO Film Unit had become the Crown Film Unit and Stuart Legg spent three years there as a producer.

In 1952, the British government dissolved the Crown Film Unit and Stuart Legg became chairman of Film Centre International, a production coordination company which Grierson had founded in 1937.

Stuart Legg was married to Margaret Amos, daughter of Sir Percy Maurice Amos.