Clifford Odets

Clifford Odets dropped out of high school to pursue acting. In the 1930s he became a charter member of the Group Theatre, the famous "Method" acting troupe founded by Harold Clurman, Lee Strasberg and Cheryl Crawford.

In 1934 - Odets joined the American Communists Party; he left the party a few months later.

Beginning with "Waiting for Lefty" (1935), Odets quickly became the most famous young playwright in America. In the next four years he wrote five more plays, including "Awake and Sing!"; "Golden Boy" and "Rocket to the Moon", whose histrionics well suited the Group's exuberant style. On his first Hollywood assignment he met (and soon married) Luise Rainer, but they lived together only briefly. Between reconciliations with Rainer, Odets had a stormy, tempestuous affair with Frances Farmer. His other conquests included Fay Wray and a host of less famous women, including stage actress Betty Grayson, who became his second wife.

His play "Golden Boy" (its film adaptation Golden Boy (1939) was directed by Rouben Mamoulian) was inspired by the story of Paul Muni when he once told Odets about how he gave up boxing because it endangered his secondary career as a violinist.

Directed two Oscar nominated performances: Cary Grant and Ethel Barrymore. Barrymore won for her performance in None But the Lonely Heart (1944).

Clifford Odets' original script for Wild in the Country (1961) had Elvis Presley's character committing suicide at the end of the film. This was screened for a preview audience, who were horrified, and the ending was changed. According to Odets friend, Oscar Levant, in "Memoirs of an Amnesiac", "... only Odets would write a story for Elvis in which he committed suicide. Actually, it was humiliating that Odets had to write that kind of picture at all, but he needed the money. Everything he was against, in the beginning of his career, he wound up doing himself".

His only Tony recognition came posthumously in 1965, sharing a book credit with William Gibson as part of the Best Musical nomination for Golden Boy (1962), based on his play.

His play, Awake and Sing (1972), was nominated for the 1974 Joseph Jefferson Award for Best Play Production at the Candelight Forum Theatre in Chicago, Illinois.

Portrayed by Jeffrey DeMunn in Frances (1982), John Heard in Will There Really Be a Morning? (1983) and Lee Breuer in Committed (1984).

Odets was the inspiration for the title character in the Coen Bros. film Barton Fink (1991).