He clashed frequently with director
Stanley Kubrick over the shooting of
Espartaco (1960), a film that star
Kirk Douglas inveigled Kubrick to direct after Douglas fired original director
Anthony Mann, who had hired Metty in the first place. Though Metty was a top lighting cameraman in Hollywood who had worked with the hands-on director
Orson Welles, he was unhappy with Kurbrick's exertion of control over the lighting and composition of the film. Kubrick himself was a card-carrying member of the cinematographer's union, an accomplished still photographer who had gone professional for "Look" magazine at the age of 17. Kubrick exerted a higher degree of control over the look of his films than did the average director, even someone as innovative as Welles. Ironically, it was "Spartacus" that won Metty his sole Academy Award, taking home the Oscar for color cinematography.
