R.I.P. Budd Schulberg

August 6, 6:45 PMClassic TV ExaminerDoug Krentzlin

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            Budd Schulberg testifying before HUAC (Associated Press)

Writer Budd Schulberg, who scripted two of the greatest movies ever made, passed away yesterday at age 95.

The son of Hollywood mogul B.P. Schulberg, Schulberg’s first triumph as a writer was his 1941 novel What Makes Sammy Run? which tells the story of Sammy Glick, a ruthless young hustler who backstabs his way to the top of the film industry. Interestingly, although What Makes Sammy Run? was adapted for live television twice (in 1949 starring Jose Ferrer and in 1959 starring Larry Blyden) and for a Broadway musical in 1964 starring Steve Lawrence, it has never been made into a movie. (DreamWorks currently owns the rights for a possible film starring Ben Stiller.)

Schulberg’s name, however, will always be associated with the films On the Waterfront (1954) and A Face in the Crowd (1957), both directed by Elia Kazan. An expose of corruption in the New York longshoremen’s union, On the Waterfront won several Oscars including Best Picture, Best Story and Screenplay (Schulberg), Best Director (Kazan), Best Actor (Marlon Brando) and Best Supporting Actress (Eva Marie Saint). (Actor Karl Malden, who had a major role in On The Waterfront, died last month.)

Schulberg and Kazan, both of them former members of the Communist Party, had testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee in the early 1950s and, to this day, many believe that the plot of On The Waterfront (in which Brando plays a mob gofer who decides to testify against his bosses) was an allegory about the morality of taking a stand against perceived evil.

Schulberg himself had this to say about his testimony: "I didn't especially like the committee, but I didn't like the way the party was trying to take over the Screenwriters Guild. They had put four young people on the board, including me. I felt that what the party was doing secretively was very wrong. It could have been the Ku Klux Klan or the American Nazis. And nobody came out and said that Stalin was killing more people than Hitler. I resented the fact that they only defended their side."

Shchulberg and Kazan’s second collaboration A Face in the Crowd (based on Schulberg’s story Your Arkansas Traveler) has some similarities with What Makes Sammy Run? In this case, the protagonist who betrays his friends and co-workers on his way to the top is Larry “Lonesome” Rhodes, a country-western singer whose phenomenal success on television gives him political ambitions. Andy Griffith, making his film debut, gave the greatest performance of his career as Rhodes.

So long, Budd Schulberg. You gave us two great movies and, if DreamWorks ever makes that film of What Makes Sammy Run? with Ben Stiller, you might give us a third cinema classic.