UO grad and Oscar nominee James Ivory to visit campus

Acclaimed filmmaker James Ivory, a 1951 UO graduate, has been nominated for an Academy Award for best adapted screenplay for “Call Me By Your Name.”

Ivory is coming to the UO Feb. 4 to introduce the film at the 26th Queer Film Festival and participate in a question-and-answer session after the screening.

“Call Me By Your Name” is a romantic coming-of-age drama set in Lombardy, Italy, and directed by Luca Guadagnino. Ivory adapted the screenplay from the novel by André Aciman. The film received three other nominations: best picture, best actor for Timothée Chalamet and best original song for “Mystery of Love” by Sufjan Stevens.

At 89, Ivory becomes the oldest male Oscar nominee. Another 89-year-old, writer-director Agnes Varda, was nominated in the documentary category and is eight days older than Ivory, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Ivory is one of three UO graduates to be nominated this year. Dennis Gassner, a 1971 graduate, was nominated for production design for his work on “Blade Runner 2049,” and Bergen Swanson, a 1996 architecture graduate, was an executive producer on “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri,” which received nine nominations, including for best picture.

Ivory grew up in Klamath Falls and earned an architecture degree from the UO in 1951. He received a master’s degree in filmmaking from the University of Southern California. His papers are held by UO Libraries.

Ivory is best known for directing films in partnership with producer Ismail Merchant, including “A Room with a View,” “Maurice,” “Howard’s End” and “Remains of the Day.”

The Merchant-Ivory films have received numerous Oscar nominations, including three best director nominations for Ivory.

“For both his incredible body of work and the beauty of this film, he certainly deserves the lasting recognition an Oscar would bring,” said associate professor Mike Aronson, head of the cinema studies department.

“It’s a universal story, about figuring out your way in the world and falling in love for the first time,” he said.