John L. Balderston
John Lloyd Balderston ( born October 22, 1889 in Philadelphia, † March 8, 1954 in Los Angeles ) was an American journalist, stage and screenwriter.
Life
John L. Balderston, who worked as a journalist for several newspapers, among others for the New York World, worked during the First World War as a correspondent in Europe.
In the late 1920s, the American publisher and theater producer Horace Liveright approached Balderston, who lived in London for several years. Balderston should for Liveright acquire the stage rights to Bram Stoker's Dracula. Liveright had previously negotiated repeatedly unsuccessful with Stoker's widow Florence on the Rights. Balderstons negotiations were successful and Liveright got the rights to perform the stage version of Dracula in America. Balderston was commissioned to rewrite the originally written by Hamilton Deane stage play for the American market. After Dracula on Broadway was successful, the Universal acquired the film rights to Dracula, but not filmed the novel, but the stage play Deanes and Balderstons.
In 1931, Balderston was hired by Robert Florey, the originally envisaged director of Frankenstein to with him Peggy Webblings stage play Frankenstein: An Adventure in adapting the Macabre as a screenwriter. After the work was finished on the script, Florey was replaced by James Whale and Balderston was not mentioned in the credits as a screenwriter.
Balderston wrote more screenplays for horror movies, how to Karl Freund's The Mummy from the year 1932. The original draft of the script came from Nancy Potham and initially bore the name of Cagliostro. As the person in charge of Universal Studios released the script too confusing, they commissioned Balderston order to rewrite the script. Balderston developed the entire plot new, so very little is left of the original version. The film was another success for Boris Karloff and Universal Studios. Balderston invented with the mummy a new movie monster that did not go back on a literary text, as Mr. Hyde, Frankenstein's creature or vampire, but the film was similarly successful, as evidenced by the countless remakes and imitations.
For the film Berkeley Square Balderston adapted along with Sonya Levien his eponymous stage play. With Karl Freund Balderston worked together one more time in 1935, at Mad Love, the second and last film Karl Freund, as a director. The script was developed in collaboration with PJ Wolfson and Guy Bungendore, based on the novel Les Mains d' Orlac by Maurice Renard. As a continuation of Dracula Balderston wrote the screenplay for 1936 Dracula's Daughter. Balderstons version was rewritten several times by an author team of Universal Studios. As early as 1931, Garrett Fort was named in the credits as a screenwriter.
1936 Balderston was nominated for an Oscar for the screenplay adaptation to Bengali ( Lives Of A Bengal Lancer ). He received another nomination in 1945 for the screenplay adaptation to The Gaslight ( Gaslight ).
In 1952 appeared the shadow of the crown, a remake of the film The Prisoner of Zenda ( The Prisoner of Zenda ), which again used Balderstons script from 1937. John L. Balderstons last film work was the screenplay for Red Planet Mars, a science fiction film that was released in 1952.