Biography
Hal Mohr (born Harold Leon Mohr) was an American cinematographer whose career spanned six decades. He began working in film as a teenager in San Francisco and shot his first feature in 1914. Mohr served in the US Army's photography section during the First World War and later became one of the first members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
He is known for his work on The Jazz Singer (1927), Captain Blood (1935), A Midsummer Night's Dream (1935), Destry Rides Again (1939) and The Phantom of the Opera (1943). Mohr won Academy Awards for Best Cinematography for A Midsummer Night's Dream (via a write-in vote in 1936, the only such competitive win) and, shared with W. Howard Greene, for colour work on The Phantom of the Opera. He received a further nomination for The Fourposter (1952).
Mohr was president of the American Society of Cinematographers on three occasions and received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. He was married to the actress Evelyn Venable from 1934 until his death in Santa Monica, California, in 1974.
