Ring Lardner Jr.

Infobox actor
name = Ring Lardner Jr.


caption =
birthname = Ringgold Wilmer Lardner Jr.
birthdate = birth date|1915|8|19
birthplace = Chicago, Illinois, USA
deathdate = death date and age|2000|10|31|1915|8|19
deathplace = Manhattan, New York, USA
occupation = Writer, Screenwriter
yearsactive = 1937-1977
academyawards = Best Original Screenplay
1942 "Woman of the Year"
Best Adapted Screenplay
1970 "MASH"
awards = WGA Award - Best Comedy Adapted Screenplay
1970 "MASH"

Ringgold Wilmer "Ring" Lardner Jr. (August 19, 1915 – October 31, 2000) was an American journalist and Oscar-winning screenwriter, who was blacklisted by the movie studio bosses during the era of McCarthyism.

Early life

Born in Chicago, he was the son of the famous journalist and humorist, Ring Lardner. After being educated at Phillips Academy, Andover, and Princeton University he became a reporter on the "New York Daily Mirror". Lardner became a Communist in 1936.

Career

Ring Lardner Jr. moved to Hollywood where he worked as a publicist and "script doctor" before writing his own material. This included "Woman of the Year", a film that won him an Academy Award for Writing Original Screenplay in 1942. Other notable scripts include "Laura" (1944), "Brotherhood of Man" (1946), "Forever Amber" (1947), MASH (1970).

Lardner held strong left-wing views and during the Spanish Civil War he helped raise funds for the Republican cause. He was also involved in organizing anti-fascist demonstrations. Although his political involvement upset the owners of the film studios, he continued to be given work and in 1947 became one of the highest paid scriptwriters in Hollywood when he signed a contract with 20th Century Fox at $2,000 a week.

Blacklisting

After the Second World War the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) began an investigation into the Hollywood motion picture industry. In September, 1947, the HUAC interviewed 41 people who were working in Hollywood. These people attended voluntarily and became known as "friendly witnesses". During their interviews they named several people who they accused of holding left-wing views.

Lardner appeared before the HUAC on October 30, 1947, but like Alvah Bessie, Herbert Biberman, Albert Maltz, Adrian Scott, Dalton Trumbo, Lester Cole, Edward Dmytryk, Samuel Ornitz and John Howard Lawson, he refused to answer any questions. Known as the "Hollywood Ten", they claimed that the First Amendment to the United States Constitution clearly gave them the right to do this. The HUAC and the courts during appeals disagreed and all were found guilty of contempt of Congress. Lardner was sentenced to 12 months in Danbury Prison and fined $1,000. He had been dismissed by Fox on October 28, 1947.

Blacklisted by the Hollywood studios, Lardner worked for the next couple of years on the novel, "The Ecstasy of Owen Muir" (1954). He moved to England for a time where he wrote under several pseudonyms for television series such as "The Adventures of Robin Hood". The blacklist was lifted when producer Martin Ransohoff and director Norman Jewison gave him screen credit for writing 1965's "The Cincinnati Kid". Lardner's later work included "M*A*S*H" (1970), for which he won the Academy Award for Writing Adapted Screenplay, and "The Greatest" (1977).

[http://www.es.hu/pd/display.asp?channel=IRODALOM0422&article=2004-0601-0956-10CKTG According to] Hungarian writer Miklos Vamos—who visited Lardner several times before his death—Lardner won an Academy Award for a movie he wrote under a pseudonym. Lardner refused to tell which movie it was, saying that it would be unfair to reveal it because the writer who allowed Lardner, Jr. to use his name as a front (as Lardner's pseudonym) was doing him a big favor at the time.

Ring Lardner, Jr. died in Manhattan, New York in 2000. He was the last surviving member of the Hollywood Ten.

Television tributes

In the episode from the second series of "The West Wing" entitled "Somebody's Going to Emergency, Somebody's Going to Jail" (written by Paul Redford and Aaron Sorkin), Sam Seaborn, while attempting to gain a pardon for someone whom he believed had been falsely convicted of communist espionage in the 1950s, comments to an FBI agent "Ring Lardner's just died. How many years does he get back?"

In an episode of NBC's "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip" (also written by Aaron Sorkin), an elderly man is discovered in the studio. When asked his name, he replies first "Bessie Bibermann", then "Cole Lardner", then "Scott Trumbo". All six names are last names of members of the Hollywood Ten.

The episode of "Robin Hood" first broadcast by the BBC on 1 December 2007 was called "Lardner's Ring".

ee also

* "The Hollywood Ten" documentary.

External links

*imdb name|id= 0488057|name=Ring Lardner, Jr.
* [http://wiredforbooks.org/ringlardnerjr/ 1985 interview with Ring Lardner Jr. at Wired for Books.org] by Don Swaim

Persondata
NAME= Jr., Ring Lardner
ALTERNATIVE NAMES= Jr., Ringgold Wilmer Lardner
SHORT DESCRIPTION= Writer, Screenwriter
DATE OF BIRTH= 1915-8-19
PLACE OF BIRTH= Best Original Screenplay
1942 "Woman of the Year"
Best Adapted Screenplay
1970 "MASH"
DATE OF DEATH= 2000-10-31
PLACE OF DEATH= Manhattan, New York, USA