Dalton Trumbo

Dalton Trumbo

James Dalton Trumbo (December 9, 1905 – September 10, 1976) was an American screenwriter and novelist. As one of the Hollywood Ten, he refused to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) in 1947 during the committee's investigation of Communist influences in the motion picture industry. Trumbo won two Academy Awards while blacklisted; one was originally given to a front writer, and one was awarded to "Robert Rich," Trumbo's pseudonym.

Blacklisting effectively ended in 1960 when it lost credibility. Trumbo was publicly given credit for two blockbuster films: Otto Preminger made public that Trumbo wrote the screenplay for the smash hit, Exodus, and Kirk Douglas publicly announced that Trumbo was the screenwriter of Spartacus. Further, President-elect John F. Kennedy crossed picket lines to see the movie.

His son Christopher Trumbo wrote a play based on his letters during the period of the blacklist, entitled Red, White and Blacklisted (2003), produced in New York in 2003. He adapted it as a film, adding material from documentary footage, Trumbo (2007).

On December 19, 2011, The Writers Guild of America announced that Trumbo will get full credit for his work on the screenplay of the 1953 romantic comedy Roman Holiday, sixty years after the fact.

Read more about Dalton Trumbo:  Early Life, Career, Involvement With Communism, Later Life, Academy Awards, Personal Life, Death, Works

Famous quotes by dalton trumbo:

    May I suggest Ethiopian?
    Dalton Trumbo (1905–1976)

    We’ve got to figure these things a little bit different than most people. Y’know, there’s something about going out in a plane that beats any other way.... A guy that washes out at the controls of his own ship, well, he goes down doing the thing that he loved the best. It seems to me that that’s a very special way to die.
    Dalton Trumbo (1905–1976)

    What a fog! Plane been buzzin’ around overhead for the last half hour. Must be like trying to find your way through the inside of a cow. I never did see such a country. Even the birds are walkin’.
    Dalton Trumbo (1905–1976)

    A good businessman never makes a contract unless he’s sure he can carry it through, yet every fool on earth is perfectly willing to sign a marriage contract without considering whether he can live up to it or not.
    Dalton Trumbo (1905–1976)

    The only kind of love worth having is the kind that goes on living and laughing and fighting and loving.
    Dalton Trumbo (1905–1976)