| Charles William Brackett | |
| Birth Date: | 26 November 1892 |
| Birth Place: | Saratoga Springs, New York, U.S. |
| Death Place: | Beverly Hills, California, U.S. |
| Alma Mater: | Williams College |
| Spouse: | |
| Children: | 2 |
| Occupation: | Screenwriter, producer |
| Years Active: | 1925–1962 |
Charles William Brackett (November 26, 1892 – March 9, 1969) was an American screenwriter and film producer. He collaborated with Billy Wilder on sixteen films.
Brackett was born in Saratoga Springs, New York, the son of Mary Emma Corliss and New York State Senator, lawyer, and banker Edgar Truman Brackett. The family's roots traced back to the arrival of Richard Brackett in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1629, near present-day Springfield, Massachusetts. His mother's uncle, George Henry Corliss, built the Centennial Engine that powered the 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. A 1915 graduate of Williams College, he earned his law degree from Harvard University. He joined the Allied Expeditionary Force during World War I, and was awarded the French Medal of Honor.
He was a frequent contributor to the Saturday Evening Post, Collier's, and Vanity Fair, and a drama critic for The New Yorker. He wrote five novels: The Counsel of the Ungodly (1920), Week-End (1925), That Last Infirmity (1926), American Colony (1929),[1] and Entirely Surrounded (1934).
Brackett was a president of the Screen Writers Guild (1938–1939) and for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (1949–1955). He either wrote and/or produced over forty films, including To Each His Own, Ninotchka, The Major and the Minor, The Mating Season (1951), Niagara, The King and I, Ten North Frederick, The Remarkable Mr. Pennypacker and Blue Denim.
Beginning in August 1936, Brackett worked with Billy Wilder, writing the film classics The Lost Weekend and Sunset Boulevard, both of which won Academy Awards for their respective screenplays. Brackett described their collaboration process as follows: "The thing to do was suggest an idea, have it torn apart and despised. In a few days it would be apt to turn up, slightly changed, as Wilder's idea. Once I got adjusted to that way of working, our lives were simpler."[2]
His partnership with Wilder ended in 1950 and Brackett went to work at 20th Century-Fox as a screenwriter and producer. His script for Titanic (1953) won him another Academy Award.
He received an Honorary Oscar for Lifetime Achievement in 1958.
Brackett died on March 9, 1969.[3] His diaries covering his screenwriting and social life from 1932 to 1949 were edited by Anthony Slide into Slide's book It's the Pictures That Got Small: Charles Brackett on Billy Wilder and Hollywood's Golden Age.
Brackett married Elizabeth Barrows Fletcher, a descendant of Stephen Hopkins of the Mayflower, on June 2, 1919. They had two daughters, Alexandra Corliss Brackett, Mrs. Larmore (1920–1965) and Elizabeth Fletcher Brackett (1922–1997). His wife died on June 7, 1948. In 1953, Brackett married Lillian Fletcher, the sister of his first wife. They had no children.[4]
Brackett was a Republican who voted for Alf Landon in 1936 and supported Barry Goldwater in the 1964 United States presidential election.[5]
("*" indicates collaboration with Wilder)
| Year | Category | Film | Result | Shared with | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1939 | Best Adapted Screenplay | Ninotchka | Billy Wilder & Walter Reisch | ||
| 1941 | Best Adapted Screenplay | Hold Back the Dawn | Billy Wilder | ||
| 1945 | Best Picture | The Lost Weekend | |||
| 1945 | Best Adapted Screenplay | The Lost Weekend | Billy Wilder | ||
| 1946 | Best Story | To Each His Own | |||
| 1948 | Best Adapted Screenplay | A Foreign Affair | Billy Wilder & Richard L. Breen | ||
| 1950 | Best Picture | Sunset Boulevard | |||
| 1950 | Best Original Screenplay | Sunset Boulevard | Billy Wilder & D. M. Marshman Jr. | ||
| 1953 | Best Original Screenplay | Titanic | Richard L. Breen & Walter Reisch | ||
| 1956 | Best Picture | The King and I | |||
| 1957 | Honorary Award |