Hall Bartlett

Hall Bartlett was born on November 27, 1922 in Kansas City, Missouri, USA. He was a writer and producer, known for The Sandpit Generals (1971), The Caretakers (1963) and Jonathan Livingston Seagull (1973). He was married to Lupita Ferrer, Rhonda Fleming and Lois Butler. He died on September 7, 1993 in Los Angeles, California, USA.

Lupita Ferrer (1978 - 1978) (divorced)

Rhonda Fleming (27 March 1966 - 1972) (divorced)

Lois Butler (? - ?)

Trivia (3) 1. Graduated Phil Beta Kappa from Yale. 2. American experimental film maker, writer, producer and director. Many of his films deal with social issues, such as racial tension, teenage angst, life in prison, and so on. His early documentary, Navajo (1952), dealing with modern American Indian lives, was nominated for an Oscar. Bartlett's chief claim to fame is the idiosyncratic feature Jonathan Livingston Seagull (1973), the tale of a bird's quest for happiness. 3. The screenplay for his film Zero Hour! (1957) was the basis for the spoof Airplane! (1980), which borrows much of its dialogue directly from the earlier film.

Biography by Hal Erickson

Yale alumnus Hall Bartlett set up his own film production company in 1952. His first feature film, Navajo, was a well-received contemporary docudrama, filmed on location at a Southwestern Navajo reservation. Bartlett himself appeared in the film as a white schoolteacher. His next project was Crazylegs (1953), a romanticized biopic of gridiron star Elroy "Crazylegs" Hirsch (played by Hirsch himself). Hirsch went on to co-star in the next Hall Bartlett Production, Unchained, another semi-documentary, this one set at a progressive California correctional institution. Bartlett co-directed his next film, 1957's Drango, and that same year wrote and directed the embryonic disaster-in-the-air film Zero Hour (again with "Crazylegs" Hirsch in the cast). After a decade's worth of virtuosity, Bartlett settled into conventional filmmaking in the 1960s. In 1973, he scored a box-office success with his cinemazation of the best-selling novel Jonathan Livingston Seagull. From 1966 through 1971, Hall Bartlett was married to actress Rhonda Fleming, who, intriguingly enough, never appeared in any of her husband's films.

http://www.allmovie.com/artist/hall-bartlett-p80872