Frances Marion
Frances Marion was an
American journalist, author, and screenwriter often cited as the most renowned female screenwriter of the
twentieth century.
Born Marion Benson Owens in
San Francisco, California, she worked as a
journalist and served overseas as a combat correspondent during the
World War I. On her return home, she moved to Los Angeles and was hired as a writing assistant by "Lois Weber Productions", a film company owned and operated by pioneer female
film director Lois Weber.
As "Frances Marion," she wrote many scripts for actress/filmmaker
Mary Pickford, including
Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm and
The Poor Little Rich Girl, as well as scripts for numerous other successful films of the 1920s and 1930s.
Encyclopedia
Frances Marion was an
American journalist, author, and screenwriter often cited as the most renowned female screenwriter of the
twentieth century.
Born
Marion Benson Owens in
San Francisco, California, she worked as a
journalist and served overseas as a combat correspondent during the
World War I. On her return home, she moved to Los Angeles and was hired as a writing assistant by "Lois Weber Productions", a film company owned and operated by pioneer female
film director Lois Weber.
As "Frances Marion," she wrote many scripts for actress/filmmaker
Mary Pickford, including
Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm and
The Poor Little Rich Girl, as well as scripts for numerous other successful films of the 1920s and 1930s. She became the first female to win an
Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay in 1930 for the film
The Big House, she received the Academy Award for Best Story for
The Champ in 1932. She was credited with writing 300 scripts and over 130 produced films.
For many years she was under contract to
MGM Studios but independently wealthy, she left Hollywood in 1946 to devote more time to writing
stage plays and
novels. She was married twice, first in 1919 to actor Fred Thomson. After his unexpected death in 1928, she then married director George W. Hill in 1930, but that marriage ended in divorce in 1933.
Frances Marion died in 1973. In 1997 author Cari Beauchamp published her biography under the title
. A
New York Times "Notable Book," in 2000, with support from the
UCLA Film and Television Archive, the book was made into a television
documentary with the same title and aired on Turner Classic Movies.
Selected screenplays:- The Little Princess is a children's novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett [i], also known for Little Lord Fauntleroy [i] ...
- Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm
- Anne of Green Gables is a children's book written by Canadian [i] author Lucy Maud Montgomery [i] ...
- The Toll of the Sea is a motion picture produced by the Technicolor Motion Picture Corporation, and ...
- Stella Dallas is a 1937 [i] film [i] which tells the story of a woman who sacrifices her own happine ...
- The Son of the Sheik
- Bringing Up Father
- The Wind
- Their Own Desire
- The Rogue Song is a 1930 [i] all-color all-talking musical romance film which tells the story of a R...
- Anna Christie
- The Big House
- Min and Bill
- The Champ
- The Secret Six
- The Prizefighter and the Lady
- Dinner at Eight
- Camille
- The Poor Little Rich Girl
Books by Marion Frances:- Minnie Flynn
- Valley People
- How to Write and Sell Film Stories
- Molly, Bless Her
- Westward The Dream
- The Powder Keg
External link
Reference
- Beauchamp, C. Marion, Frances. American National Biography Online, Feb. 2000.
