| Frances Marion | |
|---|---|
| Born | Marion Benson Owens November 18, 1888 San Francisco, California, U.S. |
| Died | May 12, 1973 (aged 84) Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Occupation | Author, journalist, screenwriter |
| Years active | 1912–1972 |
| Spouse | Fred C. Thomson (1919-1928) George W. Hill (1930-1933) |
Frances Marion (November 18, 1888[1] – May 12, 1973) was an American journalist, author, and screenwriter often cited as the most renowned female screenwriter of the 20th century alongside June Mathis and Anita Loos.
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Born Marion Benson Owens in San Francisco, California, she worked as a journalist and served overseas as a combat correspondent during World War I.[2] On her return home, she moved to Los Angeles and was hired as a writing assistant by "Lois Weber Productions", a film company owned and operated by pioneer female film director Lois Weber.
As "Frances Marion", she wrote many scripts for actress/filmmaker Mary Pickford, including Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm and The Poor Little Rich Girl, as well as scripts for numerous other successful films of the 1920s and 1930s. She became the first female to win an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay in 1930 for the film The Big House, she received the Academy Award for Best Story for The Champ in 1932, both featuring Wallace Beery, and co-wrote Min and Bill starring her friend Marie Dressler and Beery in 1930. She was credited with writing 300 scripts and over 130 produced films. She directed and occasionally appeared in some of Mary Pickford's early movies.
She was married four times, first to Wesley de Lappe, and later to Robert Pike, both prior to changing her name. In 1919, she wed Fred Thomson, who co-starred with Mary Pickford in The Love Light in 1921.[2] After Thomson's unexpected death in 1928, she married director George W. Hill in 1930, but that marriage ended in divorce in 1933. She had two sons—Fred C. and Richard (adopted). Fred earned a Ph. D. in English at Yale, taught there and later joined the faculty of the University of North Carolina. He became an editor of the writings of George Eliot, publishing editions of Felix Holt, the Radical in 1980 and later.
For many years she was under contract to MGM Studios, but, independently wealthy, she left Hollywood in 1946 to devote more time to writing stage plays and novels.
Frances Marion published a memoir Off With Their Heads: A Serio-Comic Tale of Hollywood in 1972. Marion died the following year of a ruptured aneurysm in Los Angeles.[3]
| Year | Title | Featured Stars | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1912 | The New York Hat | Mary Pickford, Lionel Barrymore, Lillian Gish | Contributing writer |
| 1915 | Camille | Clara Kimball Young, Paul Capellani, Robert Cummings | Scenario |
| A Girl of Yesterday | Mary Pickford, Frances Marion, Glenn L. Martin | actress | |
| 1917 | The Little Princess | Katherine Griffith, Mary Pickford, Norman Kerry, ZaSu Pitts, Theodore Roberts | Writer |
| Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm | Mary Pickford, Eugene O'Brien | Writer | |
| The Poor Little Rich Girl | Mary Pickford, Madlaine Traverse, Charles Wellesley, Gladys Fairbanks | Writer | |
| 1918 | Stella Maris | Mary Pickford | Photoplay |
| How Could You, Jean? | Mary Pickford | Scenario | |
| M'Liss | Mary Pickford | Writer | |
| Amarilly of Clothes-Line Alley | Mary Pickford, William Scott, Kate Price | Writer | |
| 1919 | The Cinema Murder | Marion Davies, Eulalie Jensen, Anders Randolf, Reginald Barlow | Scenario |
| Anne of Green Gables | Mary Miles Minter | Writer | |
| 1920 | Pollyanna | Mary Pickford | Adaptation |
| The Flapper | Olive Thomas, Warren Cook | Screenplay, story | |
| The Restless Sex | Marion Davies, Ralph Kellard | Writer | |
| 1921 | The Love Light | Mary Pickford, Evelyn Dumo | Director, story (uncredited) |
| 1922 | The Toll of the Sea | Anna May Wong, Kenneth Harlan, Beatrice Bentley | Scenario (uncredited), story |
| 1923 | The Famous Mrs. Fair | Myrtle Stedman, Huntley Gordon | Adaptation, screenplay |
| 1924 | Secrets | Norma Talmadge | Adaptation |
| Cytherea | Alma Rubens,Constance Bennett, Norman Kerry, Lewis Stone, Irene Rich | Adaptation | |
| 1925 | Stella Dallas | Ronald Colman, Belle Bennett, Lois Moran | Adaptation |
| A Thief in Paradise | Doris Kenyon, Ronald Colman, Aileen Pringle | Adaptation | |
| Thank You | Alec B. Francis, Jacqueline Logan | Writer | |
| Lightnin' | Jay Hunt, Wallace MacDonald | Writer | |
| 1926 | The Scarlet Letter | Lillian Gish, Lars Hanson | Adaptation, scenario, titles |
| The Winning of Barbara Worth | Ronald Colman, Vilma Bánky | Adaptation | |
| Son of the Sheik | Rudolph Valentino, Vilma Bánky, Montagu Love, Karl Dane, George Fawcett | Adaptation | |
| 1927 | The Red Mill | Marion Davies | Adaptation, screenplay |
| Love | John Gilbert, Greta Garbo | Continuity | |
| Madame Pompadour | Dorothy Gish | Writer | |
| 1928 | The Wind | Lillian Gish, Lars Hanson, Montagu Love, Dorothy Cumming | Scenario |
| The Awakening | Vilma Bánky, Walter Byron | Story | |
| Bringing Up Father | J. Farrell MacDonald, Polly Moran, Marie Dressler | Writer | |
| 1929 | Their Own Desire | Norma Shearer, Belle Bennett, Lewis Stone, Robert Montgomery, Helene Millard | Screenplay |
| 1930 | Min and Bill | Marie Dressler, Wallace Beery | Dialogue, scenario |
| The Big House | Robert Montgomery, Wallace Beery, Chester Morris, Lewis Stone | Dialogue, story Won the Academy Award for Best Writing (Adapted Screenplay) |
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| Good News | June Allyson, Peter Lawford | Scenario | |
| The Rouge Song | Lawrence Tibbett, Catherine Dale Owen | Writer | |
| Anna Christie | Greta Garbo, Charles Bickford, George F. Marion, Marie Dressler | Writer | |
| 1931 | Anna Christie | Greta Garbo, Theo Shall, Hans Junkermann | Adaptation |
| The Secret Six | Wallace Beery, Lewis Stone, John Mack Brown, Jean Harlow, Clark Gable, Ralph Bellamy, Marjorie Rambeau | Dialogue, screenplay | |
| The Champ | Wallace Beery, Jackie Cooper, Irene Rich, Roscoe Ates | Story Won the Academy Award for Best Story |
|
| 1932 | Blondie of the Follies | Marion Davies, Robert Montgomery, Billie Dove | Screenplay, story |
| Emma | Marie Dressler, Richard Cromwell, Jean Hersholt, Myrna Loy | Story | |
| 1933 | Peg o' My Heart | Marion Davies, Onslow Stevens, J. Farrell MacDonald | Adaptation |
| Dinner at Eight | Marie Dressler, John Barrymore, Wallace Beery, Jean Harlow, Lionel Barrymore, Billie Burke | Screenplay | |
| The Prizefighter and the Lady | Myrna Loy, Max Baer, Walter Huston, Primo Carnera, Jack Dempsey | Story Nominated for the Academy Award for Best Story |
|
| Going Hollywood | Marion Davies, Bing Crosby, Fifi D'Orsay, Stuart Erwin | Story (uncredited) | |
| Secrets | Mary Pickford, Leslie Howard | Writer | |
| 1936 | Camille | Greta Garbo, Robert Taylor, Lionel Barrymore | Screenplay |
| Riffraff | Jean Harlow, Spencer Tracy | Screenplay, story | |
| Poor Little Rich Girl | Shirley Temple, Alice Faye, Jack Haley, Gloria Stuart, Michael Whalen, Claude Gillingwater | Writer | |
| 1937 | Knight Without Armour | Marlene Dietrich, Robert Donat | Adaptation |
| 1940 | Green Hell | Douglas Fairbanks, Jr. Vincent Price, Joan Bennett, Alan Hale, Sr., George Sanders, John Howard | Original story, screenplay |
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