HARRIET FRANK, JR.

With a few exceptions, screen writers do not become household words. OK, there is Faulkner and F. Scott Fitzgerald. When I read of the death of Harriet Frank, Jr. at the age of 96, I drew a blank. Yet she was one of the unknown giants of the silver screen. Her list of credits is sensational. She often partnered with her husband, Irving Ravetch, and sometimes with other writers and often by herself.  Incredibly, she never won an Academy Award, not even one of those lifetime achievement deals.
The Long Hot Summer (1958) stars Paul Newman as a handsome con man and Joanne Woodard as the sheltered daughter of a wealthy family. Sparks, of course, fly. Not only on the screen but in real life. This famous pair married soon after the movie wrapped and stayed together til death did them part. 
Harriet Frank received her first Oscar nomination for the legendary Hud 1963) again starring Paul Newman, this time as the ne’er-do-well son of a straight arrow rancher (Melvyn Douglas). Patricia Neal did win Oscar as Newman’s unlikely victim. Douglas  and cinematographer James Wong Howe also won statues. Frank lost to the writers of Captain Newman MD, a very unfortunate choice. 
Ms. Frank was also nominated for the screenplay of the splendid Norma Rae (1979) with Sally Field as an unlikely labor organizer in the South. Ms. Field won the Oscar for Best Actress and the film won for Best Movie. Ms. Frank this time lost to Robert Benton who won for penning Kramer v. Kramer. 
Perhaps the best adaptation of a William Faulkner work is 1969's The Reivers. Steve McQueen is good as the rascally Boon. He talks two little boys into a road trip in a relative’s yellow Winton Flyer. The trip is a cinematic delight, capturing much of Faulkner’s terse dialog along the way. 
The Sound and the Fury (1959) is another Faulkner adaptation. It doesn’t quite make a smooth transition from the novel. It does feature the unlikley casting of Yul Brynner as a cracker. 
Conrack (1974) is a real charmer starring Jon Voight as a schoolteacher on one of the South Carolina coastal islands. The film is based on the memoir The Water Is Wide by Pat Conroy. The movie title is based on the children’s pronunciation of Conroy. They speak a local dialect known as Gullah, and have almost no knowledge of the world outside. Conroy tries to widen their world view and prepare them for life after school. The screenplay does an excellent job with the language, incorporating it, and yet making it understandable. 
Some other notable Frank screenplays include Home From The Hill (1960), The Dark at the Top of the Stairs (1960), Hombre (1967) and Stanley And Iris (1990).
All of the films in this article are available on DVD. All are for grown-ups.