Birthplace: Sutton, Surrey, England, United Kingdom
Death Date: 10/14/1987
biography
Pioneering British documentarian who helped John Grierson forge the movement in the early 1930s, first at the Empire Marketing Board and then at its successor, the GPO film unit. In the mid-1930s Wright directed "Song of Ceylon" (1934) and "Night Mail" (1936, with words by W.H. Auden); the films combined lyricism (the influence of Robert Flaherty) and social realism (the influence of Grierson) and remain landmarks of the documentary genre.Wright then turned his attention to producing (under his Realist Film Unit, founded 1938) and writing, but returned to directing in the late 1940s, again
