William Bowers

• Born: Jan 17, 1916 in Las Cruces, New Mexico
• Died: Mar 27, 1987 in Woodland Hills, California
• Occupation: Writer
• Active: '40s-'70s
• Major Genres: Comedy, Western
• Career Highlights: Support Your Local Sheriff, The Ride to Hangman's Tree, My Man Godfrey
• First Major Screen Credit: Seven Days Leave (1942)

Biography

William Bowers was a reporter in Long Beach, California before he broke into playwrighting with Where Do We Go From Here? His position as Hollywood correspondent for the NEA news service led to an RKO contract in 1942. Some of his earliest screenplay work at that studio included Kay Kyser's My Favorite Spy (1942), Brown and Carney's Adventures of a Rookie (1943), and Frank Sinatra's first important film, Higher and Higher (1943). He went on to work at Paramount and Universal, then free-lanced for the remainder of his career. He was Oscar-nominated for his scripts for 1950's The Gunfighter and 1958's Sheepman. On a less positive note, Bowers' screenplay for the 1961 Jack Webb-directed comedy The Last Time I Saw Archie resulted in a lawsuit against Bowers and Webb, instigated by the subject of the film, famed fast-buck filmmaker/entrepreneur Arch Hall Sr. Late in life, William Bowers briefly turned to acting when he was invited by Francis Ford Coppola to play the head of the Senate Investigating Committee in Coppola's The Godfather II (1974). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

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