Stirling Dale Silliphant (January 16, 1918 – April 26, 1996) was an American
screenwriter
A screenplay writer (also called screenwriter, scriptwriter, scribe or scenarist) is a writer who practices the craft of screenwriting, writing screenplays on which mass media, such as films, television programs and video games, are based.
...
and
producer. He is best remembered for his screenplay for ''
In the Heat of the Night'', for which he won an
Academy Award
The Academy Awards, better known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international film industry. The awards are regarded by many as the most prestigious, significant awards in the entertainment in ...
in 1967, and for creating the television series ''
Naked City'', ''
Perry Mason
Perry Mason is a fictional character, an American criminal defense lawyer who is the main character in works of detective fiction written by Erle Stanley Gardner. Perry Mason features in 82 novels and 4 short stories, all of which involve a cli ...
'', and ''
Route 66''. Other features as screenwriter include the
Irwin Allen
Irwin Allen (born Irwin O. Cohen, June 12, 1916 – November 2, 1991) was an American film and television producer and director, known for his work in science fiction, then later as the "Master of Disaster" for his work in the disaster film gen ...
productions ''
The Towering Inferno
''The Towering Inferno'' is a 1974 American disaster film directed by John Guillermin and produced by Irwin Allen, featuring an ensemble cast led by Paul Newman and Steve McQueen. It was adapted by Stirling Silliphant from the novels '' The ...
'' and ''
The Poseidon Adventure''.
Early life, family and education
Born in
Detroit
Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at ...
,
Michigan
Michigan () is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the List of U.S. states and ...
, Stirling Silliphant was the son of Lemuel L. Silliphant, a Canadian who immigrated to the United States in 1911, becoming a US citizen in 1916. His mother was Ethel M. Silliphant. He had one brother, Leigh, who was three years younger. The family moved to
Glendale,
California
California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the ...
when the brothers were young.
He graduated from
Hoover High School and subsequently, from the
University of Southern California
, mottoeng = "Let whoever earns the palm bear it"
, religious_affiliation = Nonsectarian—historically Methodist
, established =
, accreditation = WSCUC
, type = Private research university
, academic_affiliations =
, endowment = $8. ...
.
["Biography: Stirling Silliphant"](_blank)
''Turner Classic Movies
Turner Classic Movies (TCM) is an American movie-oriented pay-TV network owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. Launched in 1994, Turner Classic Movies is headquartered at Turner's Techwood broadcasting campus in the Midtown business district of ...
''["Profile: Stirling Silliphant"](_blank)
Museum of Broadcast Communications
The Museum of Broadcast Communications (MBC) is an American museum, the stated mission of which is "to collect, preserve, and present historic and contemporary radio and television content as well as educate, inform and entertain through our archi ...
, Chicago.
Career
Silliphant was a film and television writer with more than 700 hours of prime-time television drama to his credit, many of which earned Emmys
The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the American and international television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the calendar year, each with the ...
for their producers, directors, and cast members. However, he never received an Emmy personally as writer. ''Time
Time is the continued sequence of existence and events that occurs in an apparently irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various measurements used to sequence events, t ...
'' in 1967 referred to him in a feature article with the statement: "The moving finger...having written, moved on!"
Production manager Sam Manners called him from the road unit of '' Route 66'' from El Paso, Texas
El Paso (; "the pass") is a city in and the seat of El Paso County in the western corner of the U.S. state of Texas. The 2020 population of the city from the U.S. Census Bureau was 678,815, making it the 23rd-largest city in the U.S., the ...
. He told Stirling they could save perhaps $100,000 if Stirling could write an extra story for the show that could be shot in El Paso while the production trucks and crew were there. Silliphant obliged, and had the script ready in a couple of days. The guest star was Albert Dekker
Thomas Albert Ecke Van Dekker (December 20, 1905 – May 5, 1968) was an American character actor and politician best known for his roles in '' Dr. Cyclops'', ''The Killers'' (1946), '' Kiss Me Deadly'', and ''The Wild Bunch''.
Early life and c ...
, who was flown in to portray his part over the weekend.
Although he worked constantly in Hollywood, he had a well-known aversion against living in Southern California, where he had grown up. After he became successful, he built a house in Tiburon, California
Tiburon (; es, Tiburón, ) is an incorporated town in Marin County, California. It is located on the Tiburon Peninsula, which reaches south into the San Francisco Bay. It shares a ZIP code with the smaller incorporated city of Belvedere (for ...
, and commuted regularly by air to Los Angeles.
Television
During World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
, Silliphant served as a lieutenant in the United States Army
The United States Army (USA) is the land warfare, land military branch, service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the eight Uniformed services of the United States, U.S. uniformed services, and is designated as the Army o ...
. Upon his discharge in 1946 in the earlier part of his career, he was publicity director for Walt Disney
Walter Elias Disney (; December 5, 1901December 15, 1966) was an American animator, film producer and entrepreneur. A pioneer of the American animation industry, he introduced several developments in the production of cartoons. As a film p ...
, and was lead writer on the stories incorporated into ''The Mickey Mouse Club
''The Mickey Mouse Club'' is an American variety television show that aired intermittently from 1955 to 1996 and returned to social media in 2017. Created by Walt Disney and produced by Walt Disney Productions, the program was first televised f ...
''. He produced several independent films such as '' 5 Against the House'' with Kim Novak
Marilyn Pauline "Kim" Novak (born February 13, 1933) is an American retired film and television actress and painter.
Novak began her career in 1954 after signing with Columbia Pictures and quickly became one of Hollywood's top box office stars, ...
, '' Huk!'' and ''Maracaibo
)
, motto = "''Muy noble y leal''"(English: "Very noble and loyal")
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''. Later he broke into television, writing for the live ''Playhouse 90
''Playhouse 90'' was an American television anthology drama series that aired on CBS from 1956 to 1960 for a total of 133 episodes. The show was produced at CBS Television City in Los Angeles, California. Since live anthology drama series of the ...
''. ''Perry Mason
Perry Mason is a fictional character, an American criminal defense lawyer who is the main character in works of detective fiction written by Erle Stanley Gardner. Perry Mason features in 82 novels and 4 short stories, all of which involve a cli ...
'' and ''Alfred Hitchcock Presents
''Alfred Hitchcock Presents'' is an American television anthology series created, hosted and produced by Alfred Hitchcock, aired on CBS and NBC between 1955 and 1965. It features dramas, thrillers and mysteries. Between 1962 and 1965 it was r ...
'' soon followed.
Silliphant was known for his involvement in two TV series of the sixties, '' Route 66'' and '' Naked City''. Silliphant was quoted as saying that a number of his ''Naked City'' scripts were far superior to the script that won him the Oscar for '' In the Heat of the Night''. He adapted eight half-hour episodes of ''Naked City'' into a tie-in paperback as well, which was published in 1959. One of his later series creations was '' Longstreet'', which featured a blind detective played by James Franciscus
James Grover Franciscus (January 31, 1934 – July 8, 1991) was an American actor, known for his roles in feature films and in six television series: ''Mr. Novak'', '' The Naked City'', '' The Investigators'', '' Longstreet'', '' Doc Elliot'', ...
, who had also starred in the first season of ''Naked City''.
He wrote three television miniseries: ''Pearl
A pearl is a hard, glistening object produced within the soft tissue (specifically the mantle) of a living shelled mollusk or another animal, such as fossil conulariids. Just like the shell of a mollusk, a pearl is composed of calcium ca ...
'' (about the attack on Pearl Harbor
Pearl Harbor is an American lagoon harbor on the island of Oahu, Hawaii, west of Honolulu. It was often visited by the Naval fleet of the United States, before it was acquired from the Hawaiian Kingdom by the U.S. with the signing of the ...
), ''Space
Space is the boundless three-dimensional extent in which objects and events have relative position and direction. In classical physics, physical space is often conceived in three linear dimensions, although modern physicists usually con ...
'' (based on the James Michener
James Albert Michener ( or ; February 3, 1907 – October 16, 1997) was an American writer. He wrote more than 40 books, most of which were long, fictional family sagas covering the lives of many generations in particular geographic locales and ...
novel about America's early space program), and '' Mussolini: The Untold Story''. He wrote the script for a never-produced TV miniseries of ''Atlas Shrugged
''Atlas Shrugged'' is a 1957 novel by Ayn Rand. It was her longest novel, the fourth and final one published during her lifetime, and the one she considered her '' magnum opus'' in the realm of fiction writing. ''Atlas Shrugged'' includes eleme ...
'', the novel by Ayn Rand
Alice O'Connor (born Alisa Zinovyevna Rosenbaum;, . Most sources transliterate her given name as either ''Alisa'' or ''Alissa''. , 1905 – March 6, 1982), better known by her pen name Ayn Rand (), was a Russian-born American writer and p ...
.
Film
Silliphant wrote or co-wrote 47 feature films, including ''Maracaibo
)
, motto = "''Muy noble y leal''"(English: "Very noble and loyal")
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'' (produced and directed by and starring Cornel Wilde
Cornel Wilde (born Kornél Lajos Weisz; October 13, 1912 – October 16, 1989) was a Hungarian-American actor and filmmaker.
Wilde's acting career began in 1935, when he made his debut on Broadway. In 1936 he began making small, uncredited ap ...
); the Jacques Tourneur noir '' Nightfall''; '' Village of the Damned''; the Charles Bronson
Charles Bronson (born Charles Dennis Buchinsky; November 3, 1921 – August 30, 2003) was an American actor. Known for his "granite features and brawny physique," he gained international fame for his starring roles in action, Western, and wa ...
spy thriller '' Telefon''; '' The Liberation of L.B. Jones'' (director William Wyler
William Wyler (; born Willi Wyler (); July 1, 1902 – July 27, 1981) was a Swiss-German-American film director and producer who won the Academy Award for Best Director three times, those being for '' Mrs. Miniver'' (1942), '' The Best Years o ...
's final film); ''The Killer Elite
''The Killer Elite'' is a 1975 American action thriller film directed by Sam Peckinpah and written by Marc Norman and Stirling Silliphant, adapted from the Robert Syd Hopkins novel ''Monkey in the Middle.'' It stars James Caan and Robert Duvall a ...
'' (directed by Sam Peckinpah
David Samuel Peckinpah (; February 21, 1925 – December 28, 1984) was an American film director and screenwriter. His 1969 Western epic '' The Wild Bunch'' received an Academy Award nomination and was ranked No. 80 on the American Film Institut ...
); the Dirty Harry
''Dirty Harry'' is a 1971 American neo-noir action thriller film produced and directed by Don Siegel, the first in the ''Dirty Harry'' series. Clint Eastwood plays the title role, in his first outing as San Francisco Police Department (SFPD) ...
crime drama '' The Enforcer''; ''The Towering Inferno
''The Towering Inferno'' is a 1974 American disaster film directed by John Guillermin and produced by Irwin Allen, featuring an ensemble cast led by Paul Newman and Steve McQueen. It was adapted by Stirling Silliphant from the novels '' The ...
'', nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture (1974); and the arm wrestling
Arm wrestling (also spelled armwrestling) is a sport with two opponents who face each other with their bent elbows placed on a table and hands firmly gripped, who then attempt to force the opponent's hand down to the table top ("pin" them). The s ...
story '' Over the Top'' (the latter with its star Sylvester Stallone
Sylvester Enzio Stallone (; born Michael Sylvester Gardenzio Stallone, ) is an American actor and filmmaker. After his beginnings as a struggling actor for a number of years upon arriving to New York City in 1969 and later Hollywood in 1974, h ...
).
In addition to the Academy Award, ''In the Heat of the Night'' also earned Silliphant an Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America
Mystery Writers of America (MWA) is an organization of mystery and crime writers, based in New York City.
The organization was founded in 1945 by Clayton Rawson, Anthony Boucher, Lawrence Treat, and Brett Halliday.
It presents the Edgar Award, ...
, for Best Motion Picture Screenplay. He helped to pull film concepts together. He penned the screenplay for '' Shaft in Africa'', the third film in the '' Shaft'' series. With Chatrichalerm Yukol
Prince Chatrichalerm Yukol ( th, หม่อมเจ้าชาตรีเฉลิม ยุคล; ; born November 29, 1942), or usually known by his nickname Mui ( th, มุ้ย), is a Thai film director, screenwriter film producer and ...
, he co-wrote the screenplay to the 1994 Thai action film, ''Salween
, ''Mae Nam Salawin'' (
, name_etymology =
, image = Sweet_View_of_Salween_River_in_Tang_Yan_Township,_Shan_State,_Myanmar.jpg
, image_size =
, image_caption = Salween River in Shan State, Myanmar
, map ...
''.
He was a close friend of Bruce Lee
Bruce Lee (; born Lee Jun-fan, ; November 27, 1940 – July 20, 1973) was a Hong Kong and American martial artist and actor. He was the founder of Jeet Kune Do, a hybrid martial arts philosophy drawing from different combat disciplines th ...
, under whom he studied martial arts. Lee was featured in the Silliphant-penned detective movie '' Marlowe'' and four episodes of the series '' Longstreet''. Silliphant reportedly recommended Lee for action choreography work. They had been working on a philosophical martial arts script, '' The Silent Flute'' (later known as ''Circle of Iron
''Circle of Iron'' is a 1978 martial arts fantasy film directed by Richard Moore and co-written by Bruce Lee, who intended to star in the film himself, but died before production. The film is also known as ''The Silent Flute'', which was the ...
''), which was to star Lee and James Coburn
James Harrison Coburn III (August 31, 1928 – November 18, 2002) was an American film and television actor who was featured in more than 70 films, largely action roles, and made 100 television appearances during a 45-year career.AllmoviBi ...
, and the pre-production even went to the extent of all three going to India on an unsuccessful location hunt. India was selected because Warner Brothers could not repatriate money their films generated in India due to foreign exchange regulations. The Siliphant, Coburn and Lee project was greenlit on the condition that the film would be shot in India to use the money unused in Warner's India accounts.[
Silliphant's last screenplay was for the 1995 film '']The Grass Harp
''The Grass Harp'' is a novel by Truman Capote published on October 1, 1951Clarke, Gerald. ''Capote: A Biography'' (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1988), page 224. It tells the story of an orphaned boy and two elderly ladies who observe life from ...
''.
Personal life and later years
Silliphant had a daughter, Dayle, and son, Loren (June 18, 1950 – February 12, 1969). Loren was shot and killed at age 18 by Chester Allen Johnson, who was found guilty of first-degree murder. Loren Silliphant was buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California.
In 1974, Silliphant married Tiana Alexandra Du Long,[ with whom he had a son, Stirling, and step daughter, Melissa.
Actor and martial arts expert ]Bruce Lee
Bruce Lee (; born Lee Jun-fan, ; November 27, 1940 – July 20, 1973) was a Hong Kong and American martial artist and actor. He was the founder of Jeet Kune Do, a hybrid martial arts philosophy drawing from different combat disciplines th ...
was a friend of Silliphant. Silliphant became interested in Lee's specialties, and with fellow actor James Coburn
James Harrison Coburn III (August 31, 1928 – November 18, 2002) was an American film and television actor who was featured in more than 70 films, largely action roles, and made 100 television appearances during a 45-year career.AllmoviBi ...
they worked on developing ''The Silent Flute.'' Silliphant later penned several projects that included Lee and his abilities. The first was ''Marlowe'' (1969), in which Lee portrays Winslow Wong, a hoodlum well versed in martial arts. Lee choreographed fight sequences for the film '' A Walk in the Spring Rain'' (1970). He played Li Tsung, a Jeet Kune Do
Jeet Kune Do is a primarily wing chun kung fu inspired eclectic martial arts philosophy heavily influenced and adapted by the Taoist personal life philosophy and experiences of martial artist Bruce Lee.
Overview and philosophy
Jeet Kune D ...
instructor who teaches it to the main character in the TV show '' Longstreet'' (1971). Elements of his martial arts philosophy were included in the script.
In 1988, Silliphant moved to Bangkok
Bangkok, officially known in Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estimated populatio ...
. He died from prostate cancer
Prostate cancer is cancer of the prostate. Prostate cancer is the second most common cancerous tumor worldwide and is the fifth leading cause of cancer-related mortality among men. The prostate is a gland in the male reproductive system that su ...
on April 26, 1996, at the age of 78.
His work papers are archived at University of California, Los Angeles
The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a Normal school, teachers colle ...
's Westwood campus.
References
Further reading
* Segaloff, Nat, ''Stirling Silliphant: The Fingers of God'', BearManor Media, 2013.
External links
*
Profile
at The Original Mickey Mouse Club Show website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Silliphant, Stirling
1918 births
1996 deaths
20th-century American male writers
American expatriates in Thailand
American male screenwriters
American television writers
Best Adapted Screenplay Academy Award winners
Best Screenplay Golden Globe winners
Converts to Buddhism
Deaths from cancer in Thailand
Deaths from prostate cancer
Edgar Award winners
American male television writers
People from Glendale, California
People from Tiburon, California
Screenwriters from California
Screenwriters from Michigan
Writers from Detroit
20th-century American screenwriters
United States Army personnel of World War II
United States Army officers
University of Southern California alumni
Military personnel from California