Michael Wilson (July 1, 1914 – April 9, 1978) was an American screenwriter known for his work on Lawrence of Arabia (1962), Planet of the Apes (1968), Friendly Persuasion (1956), A Place in the Sun (1951), and The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957). The latter two screenplays won him Academy Awards. His career was interrupted by the Hollywood blacklist, during which time he wrote numerous uncredited screenplays.

Life and career

Early life

Franklin Michael Wilson Jr. was born on 1 July 1914 in McAlester, Oklahoma. In 1936, he graduated from UC Berkeley with a BA in Philosophy and a minor in English. He stayed at Berkeley for three years of postgraduate study: one as a teaching assistant in English, one on a Theban Fellowship in Creative Literature, and one on a Gayley Fellowship in American History.

Wilson had been a self-described "dilettante" as an undergraduate; it was only during his first year in graduate school that he became politically active and joined the communist movement. He was soon able to sell five of his stories to Esquire and other magazines.

Wilson met architecture student Zelma Gussin at Berkeley; they married in 1941. Zelma's older sister Sylvia was married to Paul Jarrico, who at the time was a fledgling Hollywood screenwriter, as well as being a leftist like Wilson. Zelma encouraged Michael to talk to Jarrico about pursuing screenwriting. Jarrico later recalled, "I preached [to Wilson] the gospel of film as the art form that combines all the other arts, with the greatest possible potential for political influence." Jarrico also told Wilson that if he found he didn't love screenwriting, he could view it merely as a remunerative craft to support his literary career.

Wilson's burgeoning screenwriting career was interrupted by America's entrance into World War II. In August 1942, he enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps. He trained as a radio analyst and attained the rank of first lieutenant before leaving the Marines in December 1945. He was hired as a "polisher" of the script, which was based on the fantasy short story "The Greatest Gift" by Philip Van Doren Stern. After an arbitration by the Screen Writers Guild, the script was credited to Frances Goodrich, Albert Hackett, and director Frank Capra, with "additional scenes" by Jo Swerling. Although Wilson was uncredited, he was acknowledged in the Academy Bulletin as "contributor to screenplay." He then began an adaptation of Theodore Dreiser's lengthy novel An American Tragedy. The resulting film was titled A Place in the Sun (1951).

Blacklisted

The year that A Place in the Sun was released was both a high and low point in Wilson's career. Two months after the film was nominated for the Grand Prix du Festival at Cannes in April 1951, Wilson was subpoenaed by the HUAC as a suspected Communist. Upon receiving the subpoena, he notified his employer Twentieth Century-Fox that he would not be cooperating with the committee. He was promptly fired by production chief Darryl Zanuck.

Salt of the Earth

In 1953, Wilson wrote the screenplay for Salt of the Earth (1954), a fictionalized account of a recent strike by zinc miners in Grant County, New Mexico. The movie was made outside the Hollywood studio system by other blacklisted artists, including director Herbert Biberman, producer Paul Jarrico, and actor Will Geer. The screenplay was the product of an unusual working relationship between the screenwriter and the men and women being depicted. Wilson met regularly with the local mining community at public gatherings, sometimes as many as 400 people in attendance. He would read his latest screenplay draft, solicit feedback, incorporate the miners' suggestions, and then repeat the process until all approved of the script.

Because of the film's pro-labor story and its blacklisted cast and crew, it was subject to harassment throughout production and post-production. It was banned from being shown in the U.S. until 1965. Decades later in 1992, after enjoying an underground "cult" status, Salt of the Earth was deemed culturally significant by the United States Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry. Wilson's comment reflected his long frustration with the studio approach to filmmaking, in which screenwriters didn't have control of the integrity of their work. In the same interview, he said: "Anyone permitted to tamper with a script will certainly do so, including the gaffer and the producer's wife. Most tampering by actors occurs when the producer and/or director are weak and insecure. I have a strange feeling about actors—such respect for the best of them that I expect they'll write better dialogue than my own. They never do." As Paul Jarrico once said about Wilson, "I'm convinced he would have had a happier life as a novelist."

While the Wilsons were in France, director William Wyler purchased the rights to Friendly Persuasion from Paramount. Wyler liked Wilson's original script from 1947, but he wanted some changes. He employed multiple peopleincluding author Jessamyn West, his brother Robert Wyler, and Harry Kleinerto make revisions. In the end, the final screenplay was still mostly Wilson's. In accord with blacklist restrictions, Wyler planned to deny Wilson screen credit and only assign it to West and his brother Robert. Wilson was not pleased when he learned about this, and he asked the Writers Guild to arbitrate. According to historian Larry Ceplair:

Death and legacy

Michael Wilson died of a heart attack in 1978 in Los Angeles County, California. He was 63. He was survived by his wife Zelma and their two daughters, Rebecca and Rosanna. In a public ceremony held the following March, Zelma Wilson and Carl Foreman's widow accepted the Oscars on their husbands' behalf. In 1995, Wilson was credited with an Academy Award nomination as co-writer of Lawrence of Arabia. In 1996, the Writers Guild of America West reinstated his credit for Friendly Persuasion.

Filmography

  • The Men in Her Life (1941)
  • Border Patrol (1943)
  • Colt Comrades (1943)
  • Bar 20 (1943)
  • Forty Thieves (1944)
  • It's a Wonderful Life (1946) (uncredited)
  • A Place in the Sun (1951)
  • 5 Fingers (1952)
  • Salt of the Earth (1954)
  • Carnival Story (1954) (uncredited)
  • They Were So Young (1954) (uncredited)
  • The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (1955) (uncredited)
  • Friendly Persuasion (1956) (originally uncredited)
  • The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) (originally uncredited)
  • The Two-Headed Spy (1958) (originally under the pseudonym James O'Donnell)
  • La Tempesta (1958) (uncredited)
  • Five Branded Women (1960) (originally uncredited)
  • Lawrence of Arabia (1962) (originally uncredited)
  • The Sandpiper (1965)
  • Planet of the Apes (1968)
  • Che! (1969)

References

Further reading

  • Planet of the Apes (Magazine) #2, October 1974. P. 48–52, "Michael Wilson: The Other Apes Writer," by David Johnson. An exclusive interview with the co-author of the original Planet of the Apes movie.

Bibliography

  • Merck, Mandy (2007). Hollywood’s American Tragedies: Dreiser, Eisenstein, Sternberg, Stevens. Oxford: Berg Publishers. .
  • Finding Aid for the Michael Wilson Papers, 1942-1977 via Online Archive of California