William A. Horning

{{Short description|American art director}} {{Infobox person |image = |imagesize = | name = William A. Horning | birth_date = {{birth date|1904|11|9}} | birth_place = [[Missouri]] | death_date = {{death date and age|1959|3|2|1904|11|9}} | death_place = [[Los Angeles, California]] | othername = | occupation = [[Art director#In film|Art director]] | yearsactive = 1931-1959 | employer = [[Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer]] (1931–1959)<ref name=Obituary>{{cite news|url=http://www.archive.org/stream/variety214-1959-03#page/n149/mode/1up|title=Obituaries|publisher=[[Variety (magazine)|Variety]]|date=March 11, 1959|page=86|access-date=June 23, 2019|via=[[Archive.org]]}}</ref> }}

'''William Allen Horning''' (November 9, 1904 – March 2, 1959) was an American art director and two-time [[Academy Awards|Academy Award]] winner.{{Citation needed|date=December 2025}}

==Career== He joined [[Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer]] in 1931 as a draftsman and became an assistant to the studio's supervising art director [[Cedric Gibbons]] in 1936.<ref name=Obituary/>

Together with Gibbons, he received his first [[Academy Award]] nomination in 1937 for [[Academy Award for Best Production Design|Best Art Direction]] for ''[[Conquest (1937 film)|Conquest]]''. Two years later, he received another nomination for ''[[The Wizard of Oz]]''. He waited 12 years for his next nomination for ''[[Quo Vadis (1951 film)|Quo Vadis]]''.

Following Gibbons' retirement in 1956, he became the studio's supervising art director. His first Academy Award nominations without Gibbons was for ''[[Les Girls]]'' and ''[[Raintree County (film)|Raintree Country]]'' in 1957.

The week before he died, Horning received another nomination for [[Academy Award for Best Production Design|Best Art Direction]] for ''[[Gigi (1958 film)|Gigi]]'' and at the [[31st Academy Awards]] ceremony in April, he received a [[List of posthumous Academy Award winners and nominees|posthumous Academy Award]].

The following year, he received two additional [[wikt:posthumous|posthumous]] Oscar nominations (bringing his nominations total to eight), one for [[Alfred Hitchcock]]'s ''[[North by Northwest]]'' and another for the [[1959 in film|1959]] [[epic film]] ''[[Ben-Hur (1959 film)|Ben-Hur]]''. At the [[32nd Academy Awards]] ceremony, Horning won the [[Academy Award for Best Production Design|Academy Award for Best Art Direction]] for ''[[Ben-Hur (1959 film)|Ben-Hur]]'', that year's [[Academy Award for Best Picture|Best Picture]] winner. Like producer [[Sam Zimbalist]], Horning was awarded his second Oscar posthumously, as both he and Zimbalist had died while the movie was still being filmed. To date, Horning is the only person ever to win posthumous Academy Awards in consecutive ceremonies.

==Personal life== He was married to Esther Montgomery until his death. Together they had three sons.<ref name=Obituary/>

== See also ==

* [[List of posthumous Academy Award winners and nominees]]

== References ==

== External links ==

* {{IMDb name|395178}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Horning, William Allen}} [[Category:1904 births]] [[Category:1959 deaths]] [[Category:American art directors]] [[Category:Best Production Design Academy Award winners]] [[Category:Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer executives]] [[Category:People from Missouri]]