A to Z Challenge - L is for Levin

Ira Levin, 1929 - 2007, was a versatile author and playwright. After he graduated from college, having attended attended Drake University in Iowa, the Horace Mann School, and New York University, he wrote training films and scripts for radio and television.

Levin's first produced play was No Time for Sergeants , which he adapted from a novel by Mac Hyman novel. The comedy about a country boy who is drafted into the U.S. Air Force starred Andy Griffith. The play was adapted for film in 1958 and later developed into a 1964 television comedy series. No Time for Sergeants is generally considered the precursor to Gomer Pyle, USMC.

Levin also wrote novels, and he won the 1954 Edgar Award for best first novel with A Kiss Before Dying. The novel was twice adapted for film, first in 1956 and again in 1991. I have not read the book or seen the movie, but I plan to do both as soon as I can. In 1982, Levin won his second Edgar for his play, Deathtrap, which holds the record as the longest-running comedy-thriller on Broadway. It adapted well to film, and I enjoyed the 1982 movie that starred Christopher Reeve and Michael Caine.

While I was familiar with Deathtrap and No Time For Sergeants, I did not know that Levin also wrote the novel Rosemary's Baby. I guess I did not pay close enough attention to the writing credits when I saw the film. But it was so scary, who bothered, right? I also did not know that he wrote The Boys from Brazil, which was turned into a movie in 1978; The Stepford Wives, which was filmed in 1975 and again in 2004, and Sliver in 1993.

One of the nicest benefits of the blog challenge is the opportunity to learn so many new things, either by researching for our own blog posts or reading the others in the challenge.  I'm learning all about retro televisions shows from Jeremy at Retro-Zombie, and I learned how to make the ugliest pie ever from Jenny at Choice City Native. Sorry, Jenny, but even you said the pie was ugly.

If you've been following the Challenge, what are some of the things you have learned?

A to Z Challenge - G is for Gordon

Today I thought I would feature a woman playwright and found an interesting one indeed. Like so many other writers, she, too, worked on both sides of the script, and won honors and recognition for both.

Ruth Gordon Jones was born in 1896 in Massachusetts and died in 1985, and I love this old picture of her. Doesn't she look the part?

Ruth Gordon in 1919

Professionally, she was known as Ruth Gordon, and she worked well into her 70s and 80s. Some of the interesting things I discovered about her was the roles she played in films I've seen. She played Minnie Castevet, Rosemary's overly solicitous neighbor in Rosemary's Baby, Maude in Harold and Maude, and Ma Boggs, the mother of Orville Boggs, in Every Which Way but Loose.

When not performing, Gordon was busy writing, and she wrote a number of plays, film scripts and books. In 1953 she adapted her autobiographical play, Years Ago, for film as The Actress, which starred Jean Simmons in the title role. Gordon would go on to write three volumes of memoirs in the 1970s: My Side, Myself Among Others and An Open Book. Gordon won an Academy Award, an Emmy and two Golden Globe awards for her acting, as well as receiving three Academy Award nominations for her writing.

In addition to her work on stage and in film, Gordon made many television appearances through her seventies and eighties. In the sitcom Rhoda, she played Carlton the invisible doorman's mother and was nominated for an Emmy nomination.  She also once hosted hosting Saturday Night Live in 1977. In 1978, Gordon won an Emmy for a guest appearance on the sitcom Taxi, In that episode, she played a character who tries to hire Alex Reigera, the taxi driver played by Judd Hirsch, as a male escort.

As I read up on these playwrights I'm surprised at how much of their work was unknown to me, or, as int he case of Ruth Gordon's acting, overlooked. I do remember some of those memorable characters she played, but I never remembered her professional name.

How about you? Are you as forgetful?