Joseph M. Newman (August 17, 1909 – January 23, 2006) was an American film director most famous for his 1955 film This Island Earth. His credits include episodes of The Twilight Zone and The Alfred Hitchcock Hour. He was nominated for two Academy Awards in the now defunct category of Assistant Director, for David Copperfield and San Francisco. He was also the last person nominated Assistant Director to die. Career Assistant director Newman first established his reputation in the industry as an assistant director at MGM. He worked on Clear All Wires! (1933), Gabriel Over the White House (1933), The Nuisance (1933), Another Language (1933), Dinner at Eight (1933), Stage Mother (1933), Going Hollywood (1933), Riptide (1934), and The Merry Widow (1934), working with Ernst Lubitsch. He was nominated for an Oscar for David Copperfield (1935), and worked on China Seas (1935), and I Live My Life (1935), Rose-Marie (1936). San Francisco (1936) earned him another Oscar nomination. He worked as assistant director on Lady of the Tropics (1937), Maytime (1937), The Firefly (1937), and Too Hot to Handle (1938). Director of shorts Newman began directing short films starting with Man's Greatest Friend (1938). He followed it with The Story of Alfred Nobel (1938), Money to Loan (1939), The Story That Couldn't Be Printed (1939) (the story of John Zenger), Maintain the Right (1940), Know Your Money (1940) (part of the Crime Does Not Pay series), Women in Hiding (1940), Cat College (1940), Buyer Beware (1940), Respect the Law (1941), Coffins on Wheels (1941), Triumph Without Drums (1941), Don't Talk (1942), and Vendetta (1942). Newman returned to assistant directing with Tarzan's Secret Treasure (1941) and The Bugle Sounds (1942). Feature director Newman made his debut as a director of feature films with Northwest Rangers (1941), a B-movie about the Canadian Mounties starring James Craig. Newman was a major in the Signal Corps during World War II. While there he directed the short film Diary of a Sergeant (1945) starring Harold Russell which led to Russell's appearance in The Best Years of Our Lives (1946). After the war Newman returned to directing shorts at MGM: The Luckiest Guy in the World (1947) and The Amazing Mr. Nordill (1947). He went back to features with the low budget Jungle Patrol (1948) at Fox. He went on to direct The Great Dan Patch (1949), the film noir crime dramas Abandoned (1949), with Gale