Mike Todd

Michael Todd (June 22, 1909 – March 22, 1958), born Avrom Hirsch Goldbogen, was an American theater and film producer renowned for his flamboyant showmanship, technical innovations in widescreen filmmaking, and the production of the 1956 Best Picture Oscar winner Around the World in 80 Days.

Born in Minneapolis, Minnesota, to Polish Jewish immigrant parents—his father an Orthodox rabbi—Todd moved with his family to Chicago after World War I, where he grew up in a working-class environment. Expelled from school in the sixth grade and later dropping out of high school, he took on odd jobs such as soda jerk and shoe salesman before entering the construction business, which he built into a multimillion-dollar enterprise only to lose it during the Great Depression. His entry into entertainment came in 1933 with the production of the dancing revue Flame Dance at Chicago's Century of Progress Exposition, marking his debut as a showman. By the late 1930s, Todd had transitioned to Broadway, producing over 30 shows, including the all-Black revue The Hot Mikado (1939), the wartime hit Something for the Boys (1943) starring Ethel Merman, and the musical Up in Central Park (1945).

In the 1950s, Todd shifted focus to film, becoming a pioneer in widescreen technology amid Hollywood's response to television. He initially licensed and promoted the multi-camera Cinerama process for the 1952 documentary This Is Cinerama, but sought a simpler alternative, co-developing Todd-AO—a single-lens 65mm format with American Optical Company that offered seamless wide-screen projection, variable lenses from 37° to 128°, and six-track stereo sound. Todd debuted the system with Oklahoma! (1955), which earned an Academy Award for Best Sound Recording. His crowning achievement was producing Around the World in 80 Days (1956), an adaptation of Jules Verne's novel that won five Oscars, including Best Picture, and grossed over $42 million worldwide.

On a personal level, Todd was married three times: first to Bertha Freshman from 1927 to 1946, with whom he had one child; second to actress Joan Blondell from 1947 to 1950; and third to Elizabeth Taylor in a lavish 1957 ceremony, a union that lasted just over a year and produced their daughter Liza (born August 6, 1957). Known for his extravagant lifestyle and charisma, Todd's life ended tragically on March 22, 1958, when his private plane, Lucky Liz—named after Taylor—crashed in the Zuni Mountains near Grants, New Mexico, killing him, screenwriter Art Cohn, and the two pilots en route to a promotional event in New York. He was 48 years old and is buried in Waldheim Cemetery, Forest Park, Illinois.