Howard Koch (screenwriter)

Howard Koch
BornDecember 12, 1901
New York City, US
DiedAugust 17, 1995(1995-08-17) (aged 93)
Kingston, New York, US
EducationSt. Stephen's College
Columbia University
Notable workCasablanca, co-writer
Spouse
Anne Green
​
(m. 1944)​
Children3

Howard Everard Koch (December 12, 1901 – August 17, 1995)[1][2] was an American playwright and screenwriter. He was best known for co-writing the Casablanca (1942) screenplay, for which he shared an Academy Award. In 1947 he was one of the "Hollywood Nineteen", the initial group of so-called "unfriendly" film artists targeted by the House Un-American Activities Committee.[3] After ending up on the Hollywood blacklist, Koch moved to England and wrote under a pseudonym before returning to the U.S. and resuming his screenwriting career.

Background

Koch was born in New York City, the only child of middle-class Jewish parents.[4] He grew up in Kingston, New York and was a precocious student, entering St. Stephen's College (later renamed Bard College) at age 16.[5] In his memoir, he attributed his awakening social conscience to a St. Stephen's class that he took as a sophomore. It was taught by radical sociologist Lyford P. Edwards, who sent his students to visit prisons, picket lines, etc., to learn first-hand about social issues.[6] Koch chose law as a profession and attended Columbia Law School, graduating with an LL.B in 1925.[7][8]

Career

While practicing law in Hartsdale, New York in the late 1920s, Koch began to write plays. Two of his first works were produced on Broadway: a comedy, Great Scott!, in 1929 and a drama, Give Us This Day, in 1933.[9] His play The Lonely Man opened in Chicago in 1937 under the auspices of the Federal Theater Project. Among those impressed with the play was John Houseman.[5] The following year, when he co-founded with Orson Welles the CBS Radio series The Mercury Theatre on the Air, Houseman hired Koch as a staff writer. One of Koch's assignments was to adapt the H. G. Welles science fiction novel The War of the Worlds. Koch's script, co-written with Anne Froelick and titled "Invasion from Mars",[10] was broadcast on October 30, 1938. The radio drama panicked some listeners with its news bulletin-style depiction of Martian spaceships landing in New Jersey.[4][11][12]

Koch's radio work brought him to the attention of the film studios.[4] He became a contract writer with Warner Bros. His first screenplay credit was for The Sea Hawk.[12] He enjoyed a string of successes with The Letter (1940), Shining Victory (1941), Sergeant York (1941) (which earned him and John Huston an Oscar nomination for Best Original Screenplay), and In This Our Life (1942).[13] Next, he co-scripted the film Casablanca (1942) with Julius and Philip Epstein.[14][15] It was an adaptation of the play, Everybody Comes to Rick's. In describing the Casablanca writing process in a 1971 interview, Koch said he did not collaborate with the Epstein brothers; he worked on the screenplay after they had made their contributions and left the project.[16] All three writers received an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay.[17] Among his later efforts, Koch cited Letter from an Unknown Woman (1948), adapted from the Stefan Zweig novella and directed by Max Ophüls, as a personal favorite.[18][19]

In 1943, at the request of Jack L. Warner of Warner Bros., Koch was tasked with rewriting the screenplay for Mission to Moscow, a film adaptation of the bestselling book Mission to Moscow by Joseph E. Davies, former U.S. ambassador to the Soviet Union.[20] The film had the backing of President Franklin Roosevelt who wanted American audiences to better understand their Soviet allies fighting Nazi Germany in World War II.[21] After the war, the film triggered a political backlash because of its positive portrayal of Joseph Stalin and the Soviet Union.[22][23]

In September 1947, Koch was one of the "unfriendly nineteen" film artists subpoenaed by the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) as part of a Congressional investigation into Communist infiltration of the motion picture industry.[24][25] While he was a longtime supporter of leftist and progressive causes, there was no evidence that Koch was a Communist or ever belonged to the Communist Party[26] (other Hollywood Communists later asserted he was not a Party member[27]); nevertheless, he was tainted by his association with the Mission to Moscow film.[28]

After the HUAC named Koch, his Warner Bros. contract was terminated; however, he was not banned right away from working in Hollywood. He considered himself "graylisted" where he still received a few writing assignments, but would often see his projects cancelled by advertisers or studio executives.[29] He consulted with entertainment lawyer Martin Gang, known as the best "clearance lawyer" during the Hollywood blacklist. Koch decided he would not "name names" to the HUAC as a means of clearing himself, and so he did not become one of Gang's clients.[30] In June 1950, Koch was included in the Red Channels pamphlet as a Communist sympathizer.[31] By 1951 he was blacklisted.[28]

He left the country with his children and his wife Anne Green—also an accomplished writer, and also named to the HUAC.[32] They took up residence in England where they joined other American blacklistees in exile.[18] Koch and his wife wrote for five years for film and television. They sold scripts for the British TV series, The Adventures of Robin Hood, using the pseudonyms "Peter Howard" and "Anne Rodney".[4][5] He also used the Peter Howard pseudonym when writing the Joseph Losey-directed film, The Intimate Stranger (1956).[33]

In 1956, the Koch family returned to the U.S. and settled in Woodstock, New York.[34] Koch sought help from high-profile lawyer Ed Williams to get himself removed from the blacklist.[35] Williams' efforts were successful,[36] and Koch resumed writing under his own name. His next screenplays included The Greengage Summer (1961), The War Lover (1962), and The Fox (1967).[13]

In his last decades, Koch engaged in various writing projects. He wrote a book about the War of the Worlds radio broadcast. He also worked on a novel, never completed, called Invasion from Mars.[18] In 1979 he published a memoir, As Time Goes By.

Death

On August 17, 1995, Howard Koch died in Kingston Hospital in Kingston, New York.[18] He was 93.

Works

Plays
  • Great Scott! (1929).
  • Give Us This Day (1933).
  • The Lonely Man (1937).
  • In Time to Come (1940). Co-written with John Huston.
  • The Albatross (1963).[37]
  • A Revolutionary Affair (1967).[5]
  • Dead Letters (1971).
Books
  • Invasion from Mars, ed. Orson Welles, Dell 1949.
  • The Panic Broadcast, Little, Brown and Company 1970, Avon Books 1971.[38]
  • Casablanca: Script and Legend, Overlook Press 1973.
  • As Time Goes By: Memoirs of a Writer, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich 1979.
Short stories
  • "Invasion from Inner Space", in Star Science Fiction Stories #6, ed. Frederik Pohl, Ballantine 1959.
Articles
  • "A Playwright Looks at the 'Filmwright'". Sight and Sound. 19 (5): 210–14. July 1950.
  • "Twilight of the Gods: Script to Screen with Max Ophüls". In Corliss, Richard (ed.). The Hollywood Screenwriters. pp. 125–132. Discus Books 1972. LCCN 72-87848.
Anthologies
  • Invaders of Earth, ed. Groff Conklin, Vanguard 1952, Pocket 1955, Tempo 1962.
  • The Treasury of Science Fiction Classics, ed. Harold W. Kuebler, Hanover House 1954.
  • The Armchair Science Reader, ed. Isabel S. Gordon & Sophie Sorkin, Simon & Schuster 1959.
  • Enemies in Space, ed. Groff Conklin, Digit 1962.
  • Contact, ed. Noel Keyes, Paperback Library 1963.
  • Speculations, ed. Thomas E. Sanders, Glencoe Press 1973.
  • Bug-Eyed Monsters, ed. Anthony Cheetham, Panther 1974.

References

  1. ↑ Ancestry.com. New York City Births, 1891-1902 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: The Generations Network, Inc., 2000.
  2. ↑ U.S. Census, January 1, 1920. State of New York, County of Ulster, enumeration district 174, p. 8A, family 218.
  3. ↑ Koch, Howard (1979). As Time Goes By: Memoirs of a Writer. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. p. 168. ISBN 978-0151097692.
  4. 1 2 3 4 "Howard Koch; Oscar-Winning Co-Writer of 'Casablanca'". Los Angeles Times. August 18, 1995. Retrieved August 21, 2022.
  5. 1 2 3 4 "Howard Koch". Archives & Special Collections. Bard College. 2013.
  6. ↑ Koch 1979, p. 32.
  7. ↑ Communications, Museum of Broadcast (2004). The Museum of Broadcast Communications Encyclopedia of Radio. Fitzroy Dearborn. ISBN 978-1-57958-452-8.
  8. ↑ "Howard Koch Papers, 1937-1976". Archival Resources in Wisconsin: Descriptive Finding Aids. Wisconsin Historical Society. Retrieved August 20, 2026.
  9. ↑ "Howard Koch". Internet Broadway Database. October 2019.
  10. ↑ McGilligan, Patrick; Buhle, Paul (1997). "Anne Froelick". Tender Comrades: A Backstory of the Hollywood Blacklist. New York: St. Martin's Press. p. 254. ISBN 978-0312170462.
  11. ↑ Sterling, Christopher H. (May 13, 2013). Biographical Encyclopedia of American Radio. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-136-99375-6.
  12. 1 2 Starr, Kevin (September 11, 2003). Embattled Dreams: California in War and Peace, 1940-1950. OUP USA. p. 164. ISBN 978-0-19-516897-6.
  13. 1 2 "Howard Koch". AFI Catalog. Retrieved August 21, 2022.
  14. ↑ Tablet Magazine: "The Brothers Who Co-Wrote 'Casablanca' - Writers Julius and Philip Epstein are also forebears of baseball's Theo Epstein" by Adam Chandler August 22, 2013
  15. ↑ Danca, Vincent J. (1974). An Analysis of Casablanca with an Emphasis on Five Scenes (Ph.D thesis). University of Wisconsin–Madison. p. 6. OCLC 53786798.
  16. ↑ Corliss, Richard, ed. (1972). "Howard Koch". The Hollywood Screenwriters. New York: Discus Books. p. 259. LCCN 72087848.
  17. ↑ Isenberg, Noah (February 14, 2017). We'll Always Have Casablanca: The Legend and Afterlife of Hollywood's Most Beloved Film. W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 978-0-393-24313-0.
  18. 1 2 3 4 Gussow, Mel (August 18, 1995). "Howard Koch, a Screenwriter For Casablanca, Dies at 93". The New York Times. p. D17.
  19. ↑ Koch, Howard (1972). "Twilight of the Gods: Script to Screen with Max Ophüls". In Corliss, Richard (ed.). The Hollywood Screenwriters. New York: Discus Books. pp. 125–132. LCCN 72087848.
  20. ↑ Culbert, David H. (1980). Mission to Moscow. University of Wisconsin Press. pp. 16–17. ISBN 978-0299083847.
  21. ↑ Bennett, Todd (September 2001). "Culture, Power, and Mission to Moscow: Film and Soviet-American Relations during World War II" (PDF). The Journal of American History. 88 (2): 489–518.
  22. ↑ Frankel, Glenn (February 21, 2017). High Noon: The Hollywood Blacklist and the Making of an American Classic. Bloomsbury Publishing USA. ISBN 978-1-62040-950-3.
  23. ↑ Robinson, Harlow (2007). Russians in Hollywood, Hollywood's Russians: Biography of an Image. UPNE. ISBN 978-1-55553-686-2.
  24. ↑ Dick, Bernard F. (October 17, 2014). Hal Wallis: Producer to the Stars. University Press of Kentucky. ISBN 978-0-8131-5951-5.
  25. ↑ "Testimony of Jack L. Warner". Hearings regarding the communist infiltration of the motion picture industry. Hearings before the Committee on Un-American Activities, House of Representatives, Eightieth Congress, first session. Washington: Government Printing Office. 1947. pp. 7–53. Although Koch's name is mentioned a dozen times in Jack L. Warner's testimony, Koch himself never testified before the HUAC. Like several other members of the Hollywood Nineteen, his appearance before the Committee was cancelled.
  26. ↑ Navasky 1980, p. 79.
  27. ↑ McGilligan, Patrick; Buhle, Paul (1997). Tender Comrades: A Backstory of the Hollywood Blacklist. New York: St. Martin's Press. pp. 45, 406. ISBN 978-0312170462. Walter Bernstein and Ring Lardner Jr., who were interviewed for this book in 1997, both agreed that Koch was not a Communist.
  28. 1 2 Birdwell, Michael E. (2000). Celluloid Soldiers: Warner Bros.'s Campaign Against Nazism. NYU Press. p. 174. ISBN 978-0814798713.
  29. ↑ Navasky, Victor S. (1980). Naming Names. New York: Viking. p. 104. ISBN 0670503932.
  30. ↑ Navasky 1980, pp. 105–06.
  31. ↑ Red Channels: The Report of Communist Influence in Radio and Television. New York: Counterattack. June 1950. p. 94.
  32. ↑ Vaughn, Robert (1972). Only Victims: A Study of Show Business Blacklisting (PDF). New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons. p. 278 – via World Radio History.
  33. ↑ Shipman, David (August 18, 1995). "Obituary: Howard Koch". The Independent.
  34. ↑ Ancestry.com. U.S.: Selected Jewish Obituaries, 1948-2002 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: The Generations Network, Inc., 2008.
  35. ↑ Koch 1979, p. 211.
  36. ↑ Thomas, Evan (December 4, 2012). The Man to See. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 978-1-4391-2796-4.
  37. ↑ Riley, Kathleen (April 27, 2005). Nigel Hawthorne on Stage. Univ of Hertfordshire Press. ISBN 978-1-902806-31-0.
  38. ↑ Roberts, Jerry (June 5, 2009). Encyclopedia of Television Film Directors. Scarecrow Press. ISBN 978-0-8108-6378-1. The pandemonium surrounding the 1938 War of the Worlds radio broadcast was turned into a made-for-TV movie, The Night That Panicked America (1975), with actor Joshua Bryant portraying Koch.
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