William Rose (screenwriter)

Wedding of William Rose (in his Black Watch uniform) and Tania Price in 1943

William Rose (August 31, 1918 – February 10, 1987) was an American screenwriter of British and Hollywood films.^[1]

Life and career

Born in Jefferson City, Missouri, Rose traveled to Canada after the 1939 outbreak of World War II and volunteered to fight with the Black Watch.^[2] After being stationed at bases in Scotland and Europe, he returned to live in Britain at war's end to work as a screenwriter, marrying an English woman, Tania Price, with whom he would later collaborate.^[3]

Blessed with the ability to adapt to two distinct cultures, William Rose wrote a number of successful British comedies including Genevieve (1953).^[3] He became a working associate of the American-born director Alexander Mackendrick notably for his collaboration on The Maggie (US:High and Dry, 1954) and The Ladykillers (1955).^[3] He also provided scripts for Hollywood studios, earning several Academy Award nominations for his screenwriting and winning the Academy Award for Writing Original Screenplay for Guess Who's Coming to Dinner (1967).^[4] Rose also won the Writers Guild of America award for Best Written American Comedy for The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming (1966).^[5]

In 1973, Rose's lifetime achievements were recognized by the Writers Guild of America with their Laurel Award for Screenwriting Achievement.^[6] In the 1970s, he had a brief relationship with Katharine Hepburn.^[7]

Rose settled in Jersey in the Channel Islands in 1964.^[8] He died there in 1987.^[9] He is buried in the Churchyard at St. Clement Parish Church, Jersey. William and Tania divorced; she died in 2015 aged 95.^[10][11]

Screenwriting awards

Year	Award	Category	Film	Result
1954	Academy Awards	Best Story and Screenplay	Genevieve	Nominated
1957		Best Screenplay – Original	The Ladykillers	Nominated
1966		Best Screenplay – Based on Material from Another Medium	The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming	Nominated
1967		Best Story and Screenplay – Written Directly for the Screen	Guess Who's Coming to Dinner	Won
1954	British Academy Film Awards	Best British Screenplay	The Maggie	Nominated
1955			The Ladykillers	Won
			Touch and Go	Nominated
1957			The Man in the Sky (Shared with John Eldridge)	Nominated
			The Smallest Show on Earth (Shared with John Eldridge)	Nominated
1968		Best Screenplay	Guess Who's Coming to Dinner	Nominated
1964	Edgar Allan Poe Awards	Best Motion Picture Screenplay	It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (Shared with Tania Rose)	Nominated
1966	Golden Globe Awards	Best Screenplay	The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming	Nominated
1967			Guess Who's Coming to Dinner	Nominated
1967	Writers Guild of America Awards	Best Written American Comedy	The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming	Won
1968			The Flim-Flam Man	Nominated
		Best Written American Drama	Guess Who's Coming to Dinner	Nominated
		Best Written American Original Screenplay		Nominated
1972		Laurel Award for Screenwriting Achievement	—	Honored

Filmography

Year	Title	Director	Notes
1948	Once a Jolly Swagman	Jack Lee	Credited with Jack Lee & Cliff Gordon
	Esther Waters	Ian Dalrymple Peter Proud	Credited with Michael Gordon & Gerard Tyrrell
1950	I'll Get You for This	Joseph M. Newman	Credited with George Callahan
	My Daughter Joy	Gregory Ratoff	Credited with Robert Thoeren
1952	Gift Horse	Compton Bennett	Credited with William Fairchild & Hugh Hastings
1953	Genevieve	Henry Cornelius
1954	The Maggie	Alexander Mackendrick
1955	The Ladykillers
	Touch and Go	Michael Truman
1957	The Man in the Sky	Charles Crichton	Credited with John Eldridge
	The Smallest Show on Earth	Basil Dearden	Credited with John Eldridge
1963	It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World	Stanley Kramer	Credited with Tania Rose
1966	The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming	Norman Jewison
1967	The Flim-Flam Man	Irvin Kershner
	Guess Who's Coming to Dinner	Stanley Kramer
1969	The Secret of Santa Vittoria

Notes

1. Leo Verswijver (27 February 2003). "Movies Were Always Magical": Interviews with 19 Actors, Directors, and Producers from the Hollywood of the 1930s through the 1950s. McFarland. p. 85. ISBN 978-0-7864-1129-0.
2. "William Rose - Biography, Movie Highlights and Photos". AllMovie.
3. "BFI Screenonline: Rose, William (1918-1987) Biography". www.screenonline.org.uk.
4. "William Rose - Movie and Film Awards". AllMovie.
5. "Writers Guild Awards Winners 1995-1949". awards.wga.org.
6. "Screen Laurel Award Previous Recipients". awards.wga.org.
7. Carter, Grace May (18 June 2016). Katharine Hepburn. New Word City. ISBN 9781612309613 – via Google Books.
8. "Oscar-winning screenwriter made his home in Jersey". Bailiwick Express. 3 January 2019. Retrieved 24 January 2024.
9. "William Rose". BFI. Archived from the original on 12 July 2018.
10. "'The Ladykillers' scriptwriter from Gloucestershire village dies aged 95" Archived 2015-10-24 at the Wayback Machine, Gloucestershire Live, October 23, 2015.
11. Claudia Robinson, "Tania Rose obituary", The Guardian, December 18, 2015.

External links

• William Rose at IMDb