Robert Presnell Jr.
Robert Presnell Jr. (July 21, 1914 – June 14, 1986) was an American screenwriter and activist. He became the director of radio shows such as "I Love a Mystery" and "The Orson Welles Show". Some of Presnell's notable films include "Man in the Attic" and "Conspiracy of Hearts", which was nominated at the 18th Golden Globe Awards for Best Film Promoting International Understanding. Presnell also wrote several memorable episodes of "The Twilight Zone." Early life and career. Presnell was born in Chicago, the son of Robert Presnell Sr. and his Puerto Rican actress wife, Cecilia. Aside from  being a producer and serving officer in WW2 Pacific theatre, Presnell Sr. was also a screenwriter making his son a second-generation writer. He started his writing career as a reporter for the "Milwaukee Journal". After this stint, Presnell became a freelance writer of articles and short stories for magazines. He then moved to New York City in the late 1930s, where he established a career writing, directing, and producing radio programs. Film and television. In the mid-1940s, Presnell relocated to Los Angeles, California, where he first started working on radio with Orson Welles and then as a writer of  films and television dramas such as the "I Love a Mystery" series and "Cuban Pete" (1947). He also co-wrote "Hollywood Fights Back", the 1947 radio broadcast in which 60 famous actors and filmmakers spoke out against the Hollywood blacklist. Hunt, in an interview, said that their involvement in this radio broadcast was held against them later on and that despite the existence of a caveat that would have given them an out from being blacklisted, they refused to renounce their position. In the 1950s, he wrote the screenplays for the movies "Man in the Attic" (1953), "A Life in  the Balance" (1955), "Screaming Eagles" (1956), "The Rawhide Years" (1956), and "Under the Sahara Sun" (1957). He also wrote episodes for TV series such as "The George Sanders Mystery Theater", "Lux Video Theatre", "Studio One", and "The Twilight Zone". Presnell was credited with the screenplay of the 1960 British film "Conspiracy of Hearts", which was directed by Ralph Thomas. It starred Lilli Palmer, Sylvia Syms, Yvonne Mitchell, and Ronald Lewis, and was nominated for a Golden Globe Award. According to one source, however, Presnell served as a “front” for his fellow screenwriter Dalton Trumbo, who was unable to write films  under his own name because he was included in the Hollywood blacklist. It is not clear whether Trumbo did contribute to the script since this issue is further complicated by the fact that the film is based on the teleplay by Dale Pitt and that Presnell was announced as the screenwriter in August 1956 for $20,000. The screenplay was completed in April 1957, the same year "The Green-Eyed Blonde" was released. This film was written by Trumbo and was credited to Sally Stubblefield, who served as his front. Presnell wrote his wife Marsha Hunt's 1960 documentary "A  Call From" (later renamed "A Call from the Stars"), which was about the international refugee crisis. In the 1960s, he wrote the films "Let No Man Write My Epitaph" (1960), "13 West Street" (1962), and "The Third Day" (1965). In the 1970s, he wrote the scripts of the so-called TV Movies such as "The Secret Night Caller" (1975) and "Smash-Up on Highway 5" (1976) as well as two episodes of the miniseries "Rich Man, Poor Man – Book II". Presnell served on the board of directors of the Writers Guild of America/West as well as in its arbitration  committee. He was also able to complete a novel called "Edgell’s Island", which was published by Dial Press in 1951. Activism. He strongly supported Amnesty International and the anti-nuclear organization SANE. In 1947, he and Hunt became members of the Committee for the First Amendment along with other Hollywood figures such as John Huston, William Wyler, Humphrey Bogart, and Lauren Bacall. The group was founded as a way of supporting the Hollywood Ten, a group of writers and directors who refused to tell the House Committee on Un-American Activities whether they were or had ever been Communist  Party members. In 1955, Presnell and Hunt also traveled overseas to support the United Nations' initiatives in Third World countries such as those addressing hunger and promoting world peace. Personal life. Presnell was first married to Kay Brown, with whom he had one child named Peter. On February 10, 1946, he married the actress Marsha Hunt, to whom he remained married until his death. Presnell met Hunt at a birthday party for Orson Welles. The Presnells also adopted Chon Kai Yin, an orphan from Hong Kong. He died on June 14, 1986, at the age of 71, at his home  in Sherman Oaks, California after suffering heart ailments for many years.