Robert E. Sherwood(1896-1955)
- Writer
- Script and Continuity Department
Robert E. Sherwood, a brilliant multifaceted writer, was born to Arthur
Murray and Rosina Emmet Sherwood, educated at the Milton Academy
(Massachusetts) and Harvard, and was wounded while serving with the
Canadian Black Watch in WWI. His literary career started with jobs as
movie critic at Vanity Fair and Life magazines, but he became a
full-time writer with the success of his play "The Road to Rome" in
1927. His first movie writing job came in 1924, rewriting the subtitles
for The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1923). Over the years he worked with most of the major talents in
the film business, including Alexander Korda, George S. Kaufman and Samuel Goldwyn, often
working without credit. During WWII Sherwood served in a number of
posts, most notably as director of the overseas branch of the Office of
War Information (OWI). He resigned in 1944 and returned to film
writing, winning an Oscar for his script for The Best Years of Our Lives (1946). Sherwood received
numerous literary awards throughout his career, including the Pulitzer
Prize in 1936, '39, '41, and '49, and the Bancroft Prize for
distinguished writing in American history in 1949.
