Elliott Baker (December 15, 1922 – February 9, 2007), bornElliot Joseph Cohen, was ascreenwriter andnovelist. He died from cancer in 2007 at the age of 84.[1][2]
Baker was born in Buffalo, New York, and graduated fromIndiana University. He was the author of thecomic novelA Fine Madness, which was published in 1964 byG.P. Putnam's Sons. He adapted the novel into a 1966 motion picture starringSean Connery andJoanne Woodward.[2]
A Fine Madness tells the story of Samson Shillitoe, a rebellious poet inGreenwich Village who battles a psychiatrist seeking to curb his mood swings via psychosurgery. The New York Times Book Review called the novel "a masterpiece of what one might call rebellious farce."[2]
His other novels includedPocock & Pitt (Putnam, 1971), which was the basis for the television seriesAdderly, which Baker also created;Klynt's Law (Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1976);And We Were Young (Times Books, 1979); andUnhealthful Air (Viking, 1988). His novelThe Penny Wars (Putnam, 1968) was adapted for theBroadway stage.[2]
As a screenwriter he wrote a number of television movies, and was nominated for an Emmy award in 1976 for his adaptation ofThe Entertainer. He also wrote "Side Show", the most famous episode ofRoald Dahl's 1961 televisionanthologyhorror seriesWay Out, which featured a carnival "electric woman with a light bulb for a head." He also wrote the mini-series adaptation ofLace from a novel by Shirley Conran andLace II.[3] He wrote the script for the ABC mini-series,Malibu starringWilliam Atherton andSusan Dey.
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