BASS, SAUL

born May 8, 1920, New York, N.Y., U.S. died April 25, 1996, Los Angeles, Calif. American motion-picture designer-director, especially noted for imaginative, animated titles, prologues, and epilogues. Bass studied at the Arts Students League in New York City, attended Brooklyn College, and worked as a freelance designer before moving to Los Angeles in 1946. Bass successfully directed and produced short animated films, television openings and commercials, live documentaries, and features. It was, however, his creative art direction of such motion pictures as Around the World In Eighty Days (1956), Vertigo (1958), Psycho (1960), Spartacus (1960), Exodus (1961), West Side Story (1961), and That's Entertainment Part Two (1976) that secured his international reputation.