- Charles Bennett (screenwriter)
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Charles Bennett (2 August 1899 – 15 June 1995) was an English playwright and screenwriter, probably best known for his work with Alfred Hitchcock.
Born in Shoreham-by-Sea, Sussex, England, Bennett served in World War I and worked as an actor and writer, before finding success as a playwright in the 1920s. Alfred Hitchcock's Blackmail (1929), generally credited as the first British sound film, is based on Bennett's play of the same name.
His association with Hitchcock continued into the 1930s, with Bennett writing some of the latter's most famous British films - The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934), The 39 Steps (1935), Secret Agent (1936), Sabotage (1936), and Young and Innocent (1937). Bennett left England to work with Hitchcock on his second American film, Foreign Correspondent (1940). Bennett stayed in Hollywood, writing many screenplays and directing two films, Madness of the Heart (1949) and No Escape (1953).
He later worked in American television on such series as Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, The Wild Wild West and Land of the Giants. He also co-wrote, with Anthony Ellis, the first adaptation of a James Bond novel, the 1954 television production of Casino Royale. However, the best received of Bennett's later films was an adaptation of M. R. James's Casting the Runes, entitled Night of the Demon and directed by Jacques Tourneur in 1957. His last film was also directed by Tourneur in 1965, called The City Under the Sea and starred Vincent Price.
Bennett died in Los Angeles in 1995.
Selected filmography
Writer
- Blackmail (1929)
- Partners Please (1932)
- The Clairvoyant (1934)
- The Secret of the Loch (1934)
- The Man Who Knew Too Much (1934) (story)
- The 39 Steps (1935)
- Sabotage (1936)
- Secret Agent (1936)
- Young and Innocent (1937)
- Balalaika (1939)
- Foreign Correspondent (1940)
- Reap the Wild Wind (1942)
- Joan of Paris (1942)
- Forever and a Day (1943)
- The Story of Dr. Wassell (1944)
- Unconquered (1947)
- Ivy (1947)
- The Sign of the Ram (1948)
- Madness of the Heart (1949) (also directed)
- Black Magic (1949)
- Where Danger Lives (1950)
- No Escape (1953) (also directed)
- The Story of Mankind (1957)
- Night of the Demon (1957)
- The Big Circus (1959)
- The Lost World (1960)
- Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (1961)
- Five Weeks in a Balloon (1962)
- The City Under the Sea (1965)
Director
- Madness of the Heart (1949)
External links
Categories:- 1899 births
- 1995 deaths
- English actors
- English film directors
- English screenwriters
- English television writers
- People from Shoreham-by-Sea
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