Dorothy Emma Arzner (January 3, 1897 – October 1, 1979) was an American film director whose career in Hollywood spanned from the silent era of the 1920s into the early 1940s. From 1927 until her retirement from feature directing in 1943, Arzner was the only female director working in Hollywood. Additionally, she was one of a very few women able to establish a successful and long career in Hollywood as a film director until the 1970s. Arzner made a total of twenty films between 1927 and 1943 and launched the careers of a number of Hollywood actresses, including Katharine Hepburn, Rosalind Russell, and Lucille Ball. Additionally, Arzner was the first woman to join the Directors Guild of America and the first woman to direct a sound film.
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Dorothy Arzner was a pioneering American film director who worked in Hollywood from the late 1920s through the early 1940s as the sole female studio director of her era.
She is known for directing classic Hollywood features such as Dance, Girl, Dance, Christopher Strong, and Merrily We Go to Hell.
She worked primarily within major studio systems like Paramount Pictures and RKO during the golden age of Hollywood.
