Paddy Chayefsky
| Paddy Chayefsky | |
|---|---|
Circa 1972
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| Born |
Sidney Aaron Chayefsky January 29, 1923 The Bronx, New York City, New York, U.S. |
| Died | August 1, 1981 (aged 58) New York City, New York, U.S. |
| Alma mater | City College of New York (1943) |
| Occupation | Playwright, novelist and screenwriter |
| Years active | 1944–1980 |
| Spouse(s) | Susan Sackler (m. 1949–1981, his death) |
Sidney Aaron "Paddy" Chayefsky (January 29, 1923 – August 1, 1981) was an American playwright, screenwriter and novelist. He is the only person to have won three solo Academy Awards for Best Screenplay (the other three-time winners, Francis Ford Coppola, Charles Brackett, Woody Allen and Billy Wilder, have all shared their awards with co-writers).
He was considered one of the most renowned dramatists of the so-called Golden Age of Television. His intimate, realistic scripts provided a naturalistic style of television drama for the 1950s, and he was regarded as the central figure in the "kitchen sink realism" movement of American television.Martin Gottfried wrote in All His Jazz that Chayefsky "was a successful writer, the most successful graduate of television's slice of life school of naturalism."
Following his critically acclaimed teleplays, Chayefsky continued to succeed as a playwright and novelist. As a screenwriter, he received three Academy Awards for Marty (1955), The Hospital (1971) and Network (1976). The movie Marty was based on his own television drama about a relationship between two lonely people finding love. Network was his scathing satire of the television industry and The Hospital was also satiric. Film historian David Thomson called The Hospital "daring, uninhibited, and prophetic. No one else would have dreamed of doing it." His screenplay for Network is often regarded as his masterpiece, and has been hailed as "the kind of literate, darkly funny and breathtakingly prescient material that prompts many to claim it as the greatest screenplay of the 20th century."
Chayefsky's early stories were frequently influenced by the author's childhood in The Bronx. Chayefsky was part of the inaugural class of inductees into the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences' Television Hall of Fame. He received this honor three years after his death, in 1984.
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