Fred Haines (February 27, 1936 – May 4, 2008) was an American
screenwriter and
film director.
Early life
Haines was born in
Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...
in 1936, and later moved to
Tucson, Arizona
, "(at the) base of the black ill
, nicknames = "The Old Pueblo", "Optics Valley", "America's biggest small town"
, image_map =
, mapsize = 260px
, map_caption = Interactive map ...
with his family. He joined the
United States Navy
The United States Navy (USN) is the maritime service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. It is the largest and most powerful navy in the world, with the estimated tonnage ...
in 1953, and served until 1956 when he received an
honorable discharge. While in the Navy, he had married Dede Wright, the daughter of his commanding
Admiral, although they divorced in 1961 after having two children.
[Rourke, Mary]
Fred Haines, 72; film writer and director
''Los Angeles Times
The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the U ...
'', May 22, 2008.
Film career
After leaving the military, Haines studied literature at
Columbia University
Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
and the
University of Arizona
The University of Arizona (Arizona, U of A, UArizona, or UA) is a public land-grant research university in Tucson, Arizona. Founded in 1885 by the 13th Arizona Territorial Legislature, it was the first university in the Arizona Territory.
T ...
before receiving his degree from the
University of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...
. He got a job at
KPFA, where he met film director
Joseph Strick through film critic
Pauline Kael
Pauline Kael (; June 19, 1919 – September 3, 2001) was an American film critic who wrote for ''The New Yorker'' magazine from 1968 to 1991. Known for her "witty, biting, highly opinionated and sharply focused" reviews, Kael's opinions oft ...
. Strick was impressed with Haines' intellectual curiosity and film knowledge, and got him a job in the writing department at
Columbia Pictures
Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production studio that is a member of the Sony Pictures Motion Picture Group, a division of Sony Pictures Entertainment, which is one of the Big Five studios and a subsidiary of the mu ...
.
[ Kennedy, Douglas]
OBITUARY - Fred Haines: Screenwriter who adapted 'Ulysses'
''The Independent
''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publish ...
'', May 10, 2008.
Strick obtained the film rights to the
James Joyce
James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish novelist, poet, and literary critic. He contributed to the modernist avant-garde movement and is regarded as one of the most influential and important writers of ...
novel ''
Ulysses'', and brought Haines on board as co-writer and
associate producer
A film producer is a person who oversees film production. Either employed by a production company or working independently, producers plan and coordinate various aspects of film production, such as selecting the script, coordinating writing, di ...
for the film, with Strick directing. ''
Ulysses'' was released in 1967, and was praised for its faithfulness to Joyce's novel, receiving a nomination for
Best Adapted Screenplay at the
1967 Academy Awards. While filming ''Ulysses'' in
Ireland
Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...
, Haines met his second wife, Frances McCormack.
Haines continued to work closely with Strick, although he requested his name be taken off the credits for Strick's 1970 adaptation of
Henry Miller
Henry Valentine Miller (December 26, 1891 – June 7, 1980) was an American novelist. He broke with existing literary forms and developed a new type of semi-autobiographical novel that blended character study, social criticism, philosophical ref ...
's ''
Tropic of Cancer
The Tropic of Cancer, which is also referred to as the Northern Tropic, is the most northerly circle of latitude on Earth at which the Sun can be directly overhead. This occurs on the June solstice, when the Northern Hemisphere is tilted tow ...
'' after a disagreement between the pair. Haines spent the early 1970s trying to arrange funding for his proposed adaptation of
Hermann Hesse
Hermann Karl Hesse (; 2 July 1877 – 9 August 1962) was a German-Swiss poet, novelist, and painter. His best-known works include ''Demian'', '' Steppenwolf'', '' Siddhartha'', and ''The Glass Bead Game'', each of which explores an individual's ...
's novel ''
Steppenwolf''.
The film version was released in 1974, with Haines directing the film himself.
When McCormack fell ill with
multiple sclerosis, Haines and his wife moved to Ireland to be closer to her family and the
Irish health care system. The couple lived in a rented apartment in the house of writer
Constantine Fitzgibbon on the outskirts of
Dublin
Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 c ...
, and Haines worked as a script editor for the Irish broadcaster
RTÉ and helped to run Stage One, a
fringe theatre company with fellow American expatriate writer
Douglas Kennedy.
Later life
By 1984, money troubles prompted Haines and McCormack to return to Los Angeles. Their marriage ended in 2000,
and Haines later lived next door to his son Sean in
Venice Beach
Venice is a neighborhood of the city of Los Angeles within the Westside region of Los Angeles County, California.
Venice was founded by Abbot Kinney in 1905 as a seaside resort town. It was an independent city until 1926, when it was annexed by ...
until he died aged 72 on May 4, 2008, due to complications from
lung cancer
Lung cancer, also known as lung carcinoma (since about 98–99% of all lung cancers are carcinomas), is a malignant lung tumor characterized by uncontrolled cell growth in tissues of the lung. Lung carcinomas derive from transformed, malign ...
.
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Haines, Fred
1936 births
2008 deaths
American male screenwriters
University of California, Berkeley alumni
United States Navy sailors
Writers from Los Angeles
Deaths from lung cancer in California
Film directors from Los Angeles
American expatriates in Ireland
Screenwriters from California
20th-century American male writers
20th-century American screenwriters