Miloš Forman

Czech American director, screenwriter, and professor (1932–2018)

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Directors rank#153
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Lived 1932–2018, aged 86United States

United States DirectorsMovie Director

Wikipedia
81 languages
Cross-language footprint
Era
1932–2018
Aged 86
Known for
One Flew Over the Cuck…
1975

Summary

Updated 2026-06-10

He made a satire so sharp the Communist government banned it, then left for America and won two Oscars directing a psych-ward rebellion and Mozart's downfall.

Biography

About

Forman rose in Czechoslovakia as a key voice of the New Wave, until his 1967 film The Firemen's Ball — read as a biting take on Eastern European Communism — played briefly during the Prague Spring, then got banned after the Warsaw Pact invasion in 1968. He emigrated to the United States that year and kept working. In 1975 he won his first Academy Award for Best Director with One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, the psychological drama that became a landmark. Nine years later he took a second Oscar for Amadeus, the biographical study of Mozart. Between and beyond those peaks he directed Hair, Ragti…

Voice

In their own words

Sourced, dated quotes from Miloš Forman

Miloš Forman

said18 Jan 1997

All the Sixties were complicated, you know. On the one hand it was funny too, you know; on the other hand it was cruel, you know.

— National Security Archive interview (18 January 1997)

Miloš Forman

said18 Jan 1997

You know, you have to really decide where you want to live: if you want to live in the jungle or in the zoo. Because if you want the beauty, if you want freedom, the jungle is...

— National Security Archive interview (18 January 1997)

Miloš Forman

said18 Jan 1997