David Scott Milton (September 15, 1934 – January 13, 2020) was an American author, playwright, screenwriter, and actor. His plays are known for their theatricality, wild humor, and poetic realism, while his novels and films are darker and more naturalistic. As a novelist, he has been compared to

Graham Greene Henry Graham Greene (2 October 1904 – 3 April 1991) was an English writer and journalist regarded by many as one of the leading English novelists of the 20th century. Combining literary acclaim with widespread popularity, Greene acquir ...

John Steinbeck John Ernst Steinbeck Jr. (; February 27, 1902 – December 20, 1968) was an American writer and the 1962 Nobel Prize in Literature winner "for his realistic and imaginative writings, combining as they do sympathetic humor and keen social ...

, and

Nelson Algren Nelson Algren (born Nelson Ahlgren Abraham; March 28, 1909 – May 9, 1981) was an American writer. His 1949 novel ''The Man with the Golden Arm'' won the National Book Award and was adapted as the 1955 film of the same name. Algren articulated ...

. Ben Gazzara’s performance in Milton’s play, ''Duet'', received a Tony nomination. Another play, ''Skin'', won the Neil Simon Playwrights Award. His theater piece, ''Murderers Are My Life'', was nominated as best one-man show by the Valley Theater League of Los Angeles. His second novel, ''Paradise Road'', was given the '' Mark Twain Journal'' award "for significant contribution to American literature."

Early years

Milton was born during the

Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...

to a working class Jewish family in

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...

. His grandparents emigrated from a small village near Botoşani,

Romania Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, S ...

. His father, Si Milton, became a truck driver, then a yeast salesman, and eventually a bakery and restaurant owner. Milton's work as an apprentice baker contributed to his play, ''Bread'', which debuted at The American Place Theater in New York and had a successful run at the

Theater Dortmund Theater Dortmund is a theatrical organization that produces operas, musicals, ballets, plays, and concerts in Dortmund, Germany. It was founded as the Stadttheater Dortmund in 1904. Supported by the German Government, the organization owns and o ...

in Dortmund, Germany. ''Duet'' which opened on Broadway in the mid-seventies also had productions in German at the Kreis Theater in Vienna, Austria. In the spring of 1996, it had its premiere in Germany at the

Düsseldorfer Schauspielhaus The is a theatre building and company in Düsseldorf. The present building with two major auditoria was designed by the architect and built between 1965 and 1969. It opened in 1970. History The theatre dates back to 1747 when during the ...

. A new play, ''Catching a Cab'', under the auspices of

Gustav Kiepenheuer Kiepenheuer & Witsch is a German publishing house, established in 1948 by Joseph C. Witsch and on behalf of Gustav Kiepenheuer (who was already terminally ill). The partners initially held respectively 30% and 40% of the company's share capita ...

, had also been optioned for German production. Milton was an early member of the

avant-garde The avant-garde (; In 'advance guard' or ' vanguard', literally 'fore-guard') is a person or work that is experimental, radical, or unorthodox with respect to art, culture, or society.John Picchione, The New Avant-garde in Italy: Theoretical ...

Theatre Genesis, along with Sam Shepard,

Leonard Melfi Leonard Melfi (February 21, 1932 – October 28, 2001) was an American playwright and actor whose work has been widely produced on the American stage. Life and career Leonard was the eldest child of Leonard and Louise Melfi, who owned and ...

and

Murray Mednick Murray Mednick (born 1939) is an American playwright and poet. He is best known as founder of the Padua Hills Playwrights Workshop/Festival, where he served as artistic director from 1978 to 1995. He has received numerous awards for his plays, i ...

. He has had more than a dozen plays performed Off-Off-Broadway including ''The Interrogation Room'', ''Halloween Mask'', ''The Metaphysical Cop'', and ''Scraping Bottom''. ''Scraping Bottom'', under the title of ''

Born to Win ''Born to Win'' is a 1971 black comedy crime drama film directed by Ivan Passer and starring George Segal, Karen Black, Paula Prentiss, Hector Elizondo, Jay Fletcher and Robert De Niro. Filming locations took place in Manhattan, specifically T ...

'', became the Czech director Ivan Passer's first American film, and starred

George Segal George Segal Jr. (February 13, 1934 – March 23, 2021) was an American actor. He became popular in the 1960s and 1970s for playing both dramatic and comedic roles. After first rising to prominence with roles in acclaimed films such as ''Ship o ...

Karen Black Karen Blanche Black (née Ziegler; July 1, 1939 – August 8, 2013) was an American actress, screenwriter, singer, and songwriter. She rose to prominence for her work in various studio and independent films in the 1970s, frequently portrayi ...

and Paula Prentiss. Pauline Kael has characterized this title change as perhaps the most extreme in the history of American cinema. Other plays were ''Duet for Solo Voice'' and ''Bread'' at The American Place Theater and a revised version of ''Duet for Solo Voice'', re-titled ''Duet'', on Broadway with Ben Gazzara. Gazzara's performance earned him a

Tony Tony may refer to: People and fictional characters * Tony (given name), including a list of people and fictional characters * Gregory Tony (born 1978), American law enforcement officer * Motu Tony (born 1981), New Zealand international rugby leagu ...

nomination. In Los Angeles, ''Skin'', for which Milton won the Neil Simon Playwrights Award, ran for nearly a year at The Odyssey Theater. He has had six novels published: ''The Quarterback'' (

Dell Publishing Dell Publishing Company, Inc. is an American publisher of books, magazines and comic books, that was founded in 1921 by George T. Delacorte Jr. with $10,000 (approx. $145,000 in 2021), two employees and one magazine title, ''I Confess'', and ...

), ''Paradise Road'' (Atheneum), ''Kabbalah'' (

Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich Harcourt () was an American publishing firm with a long history of publishing fiction and nonfiction for adults and children. The company was last based in San Diego, California, with editorial/sales/marketing/rights offices in New York City a ...

), ''Skyline'' (

G. P. Putnam's Sons G. P. Putnam's Sons is an American book publisher based in New York City, New York. Since 1996, it has been an imprint of the Penguin Group. History The company began as Wiley & Putnam with the 1838 partnership between George Palmer Putnam and J ...

), ''The Fat Lady Sings'' (

iUniverse iUniverse, founded in October 1999, is an American self-publishing company based in Bloomington, Indiana.Kevin Abourezk"iUniverse to move to Indiana" incoln Journal Star, January 22, 2008 History iUniverse focuses on print-on-demand self-publi ...

), and ''Iron City'' hite Whisker Books ''Paradise Road'' was given the Mark Twain Journal award "for significant contribution to American literature." His plays ''Duet'' and ''Skin'' are also in print. Milton's short stories have appeared in ''The Southern California Anthology, The Pearl River Review, The Southern'' (Lafayette, Louisiana) ''Anthology'', among others. His adaptation of

David Hare David Hare may refer to: *David Hare (philanthropist) (1775–1842), Scottish philanthropist *David Hare (artist) (1917–1992), American sculptor and photographer *David Hare (playwright) (born 1947), English playwright and theatre and film direc ...

's ''Knuckle'' was seen on

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcasting, public broadcaster and Non-commercial activity, non-commercial, Terrestrial television, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly fu ...

television. Other television work includes a stint as story editor on ''

Starsky and Hutch ''Starsky & Hutch'' is an American action television series, which consisted of a 72-minute pilot movie (originally aired as a ''Movie of the Week'' entry) and 92 episodes of 50 minutes each. The show was created by William Blinn (inspired by th ...

'' and scripts for the

John Houseman John Houseman (born Jacques Haussmann; September 22, 1902 – October 31, 1988) was a Romanian-born British-American actor and producer of theatre, film, and television. He became known for his highly publicized collaboration with director ...

syndicated show, '' Tales of the Unexpected''. He had written screenplays for directors, Peter Bogdanovich, Ivan Passer,

Sidney Pollack Sydney Irwin Pollack (July 1, 1934 – May 26, 2008) was an American film director, producer and actor. Pollack directed more than 20 films and 10 television shows, acted in over 30 movies or shows and produced over 44 films. For his film ''Out ...

Dick Richards Dick Richards (born 1936) is an American film director, producer, and screenwriter. Known as a storyteller and an “actor’s director”, Richards worked with Robert Mitchum, Gene Hackman, Martin Sheen, Blythe Danner, Catherine Deneuve, Al ...

, and Irvin Kershner. Since 1977, he had been a Senior Lecturer in Drama and Adjunct Professor in the Master of Professional Writing Program at the

University of Southern California The University of Southern California (USC, SC, or Southern Cal) is a Private university, private research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1880 by Robert M. Widney, it is the oldest private research university in C ...

. He also taught screenwriting in the cinema department. He had been a special lecturer at Goddard College and at CalArts, as well as consultant to the creative writing program at

The University of South Alabama The University of South Alabama (USA) is a public research university in Mobile, Alabama. It was created by the Alabama Legislature in May, 1963, and replaced existing extension programs operated in Mobile by the University of Alabama. The first ...

and literary consultant to Scott, Foresman Publishers, and Warner Books. He had conducted screenwriting seminars at the

German Film and Television Academy The Deutsche Film- und Fernsehakademie Berlin (DFFB, German Film and Television Academy Berlin) is a film school in Berlin, Germany. In the German film school ranking of FOCUS (Issue 22/2006), the dffb - together with the Academy of Media Arts Co ...

in Berlin and the

Duke University Duke University is a private research university in Durham, North Carolina. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present-day city of Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1892. In 1924, tobacco and electric power industrialist James ...

Film and Television Program. He was appointed to the advisory board of the

Christopher Isherwood Christopher William Bradshaw Isherwood (26 August 1904 – 4 January 1986) was an Anglo-American novelist, playwright, screenwriter, autobiographer, and diarist. His best-known works include '' Goodbye to Berlin'' (1939), a semi-autobiographical ...

Foundation along with, among others,

David Hockney David Hockney (born 9 July 1937) is an English painter, draftsman, printmaker, stage designer, and photographer. As an important contributor to the pop art movement of the 1960s, he is considered one of the most influential British artists o ...

, Michael York, John Schlesinger, and Armistead Maupin. For thirteen years, until 2004, he ran a writers' workshop on the Maximum Security Yard of the

California Correctional Institution California Correctional Institution (CCI) is a supermax state prison in the city of Tehachapi in southern California. CCI is sometimes referred to as "Tehachapi prison" or "Tehachapi".Pepper, Art, and Laurie Pepper. ''Straight Life: The Story o ...

at Tehachapi where his class consisted of a dozen murderers. He mounted a one-man show, “Murderers Are My Life”, based on his prison experiences which ran for four months at The Two Roads Theater in Studio City, CA. It was also seen at The Schoolhouse Theater in Croton Falls, New York and The Studio Theater in Manhattan. It received a nomination as best one-man show by the Valley Theater League of Los Angeles.

Family

Milton married Sheila Kuester, an intensive care nurse, in 1981. They have two children, Abby and Kyle. They were divorced in 1991. David (Also known as Dave) died on January 13, 2020. He was 85 years old.

Acting

Film: ''

'', ''Rollercoaster'', ''Mask'', ''Ruby and Oswald'', ''

Billy Jack Goes to Washington ''Billy Jack Goes to Washington'' is a 1977 American political drama film starring Tom Laughlin, the fourth film in the ''Billy Jack'' series, and although the earlier films saw enormous success, this film did not. The film only had limited sc ...

''. Television: '' Hill Street Blues'', '' Police Story'', ''

'', ''

Nero Wolfe Nero Wolfe is a brilliant, obese and eccentric fictional armchair detective created in 1934 by American mystery writer Rex Stout. Wolfe was born in Montenegro and keeps his past murky. He lives in a luxurious brownstone on West 35th Street in Ne ...

'', ''

Julie Farr, M.D. ''Julie Farr, M.D.'' ( ''Having Babies'') is an American medical drama series that aired on ABC from March 14, 1978 until June 26, 1979. It followed three television movies called ''Having Babies'' which aired from 1976 to 1978, and was not renewed ...

'', ''Kaz'', ''

Charlie's Angels ''Charlie's Angels'' is an American crime drama television series that aired on ABC from September 22, 1976, to June 24, 1981, producing five seasons and 115 episodes. The series was created by Ivan Goff and Ben Roberts and was produced by Aa ...

'', '' Vega$'', and '' Strike Force''. Theater: New York— Gorky’s ''

Lower Depths ''The Lower Depths'' (russian: На дне, translit=Na dne, literally: ''At the bottom'') is a play by Russian dramatist Maxim Gorky written in 1902 and produced by the Moscow Arts Theatre on December 18, 1902 under the direction of Konstantin St ...

'',

Giraudoux Hippolyte Jean Giraudoux (; 29 October 1882 – 31 January 1944) was a French novelist, essayist, diplomat and playwright. He is considered among the most important French dramatists of the period between World War I and World War II. His wo ...

’s '' Song of Songs'' (with

Delphine Seyrig Delphine Claire Beltiane Seyrig (; 10 April 1932 – 15 October 1990) was a Lebanese-born French actress and film director. She came to prominence in Alain Resnais's 1961 film ''Last Year at Marienbad'', and later acted in films by Francois ...

Saroyan Saroyan is a family name of Armenian origin. It may refer to: * Camille Saroyan, a character in the TV series ''Bones'' * Sedrak Saroyan (1967–2022), Armenian general and politician * William Saroyan (1908–1981), Pulitzer Prize–winning Arme ...

’s ''The Cave Dwellers'',

Shakespeare William Shakespeare ( 26 April 1564 – 23 April 1616) was an English playwright, poet and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's nation ...

’s ''

Measure for Measure ''Measure for Measure'' is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1603 or 1604 and first performed in 1604, according to available records. It was published in the ''First Folio'' of 1623. The play's plot features its ...

'' (with Nina Foch). Stratford, Conn., the

American Shakespeare Festival The American Shakespeare Theatre was a theater company based in Stratford, Connecticut, United States. It was formed in the early 1950s by Lawrence Langner, Lincoln Kirstein, John Percy Burrell, and philanthropist Joseph Verner Reed. The Amer ...

— ''

King John King John may refer to: Rulers * John, King of England (1166–1216) * John I of Jerusalem (c. 1170–1237) * John Balliol, King of Scotland (c. 1249–1314) * John I of France (15–20 November 1316) * John II of France (1319–1364) * John I o ...

'' (with

Mildred Dunnock Mildred Dorothy Dunnock (January 25, 1901 – July 5, 1991) was an American stage and screen actress. She was twice nominated for an Academy Award: first ''Death of a Salesman'' in 1951, then ''Baby Doll'' in 1956. Early life Born in Baltimore, ...

and Fritz Weaver), ''Measure for Measure'' (with Nina Foch), '' Taming of the Shrew'' (with Foch & Pernell Roberts), ''

Othello ''Othello'' (full title: ''The Tragedy of Othello, the Moor of Venice'') is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare, probably in 1603, set in the contemporary Ottoman–Venetian War (1570–1573) fought for the control of the Island of Cypru ...

'' (with Earl Hyman and Alfred Drake), ''

The Merchant of Venice ''The Merchant of Venice'' is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written between 1596 and 1598. A merchant in Venice named Antonio defaults on a large loan provided by a Jewish moneylender, Shylock. Although classified as ...

'' (with

Katharine Hepburn Katharine Houghton Hepburn (May 12, 1907 – June 29, 2003) was an American actress in film, stage, and television. Her career as a Hollywood leading lady spanned over 60 years. She was known for her headstrong independence, spirited perso ...

and Morris Carnovsky) '' Much Ado About Nothing'' (Hepburn & Alfred Drake) National Tours—''Much Ado About Nothing'' (with Katharine Hepburn and Alfred Drake); ''

Lamp at Midnight ''Lamp At Midnight'' is a play that was written by Barrie Stavis, and first produced in 1947 at New Stages, New York. The play treats the 17th Century Galileo affair, which was a profound conflict between the Roman Catholic Church and Galileo Gali ...

'' (directed by Sir

Tyrone Guthrie Sir William Tyrone Guthrie (2 July 1900 – 15 May 1971) was an English theatrical director instrumental in the founding of the Stratford Festival of Canada, the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and the Tyrone Guthrie Centre at his ...

)

Sources

''Contemporary Authors Online''.

The Gale Group Gale is a global provider of research and digital learning resources. The company is based in Farmington Hills, Michigan, west of Detroit. It has been a division of Cengage since 2007. The company, formerly known as Gale Research and the Gale G ...

, 2002. PEN 0000069037.

References

External links

*
Amarillo Bay presents On David Scott Milton by James P. White
{{DEFAULTSORT:Milton, David Scott 1934 births 2020 deaths American people of Romanian-Jewish descent Jewish American writers Writers from Pittsburgh Male actors from Pittsburgh University of Southern California faculty 20th-century American dramatists and playwrights American male screenwriters American male dramatists and playwrights 20th-century American male writers Screenwriters from California Screenwriters from Pennsylvania 21st-century American Jews