John Lee Mahin (August 23, 1902,Evanston, Illinois – April 18, 1984, Los Angeles) was an Americanscreenwriter andproducer of films who was active inHollywood from the 1930s to the 1960s. He was known as the favorite writer ofClark Gable andVictor Fleming.[1] In the words of one profile, he had "a flair for rousing adventure material, and at the same time he wrote some of the raciest and most sophisticated sexual comedies of that period."[2]
Mahin was born inWinnetka, Illinois in 1902, the son of John Lee Mahin, Sr. (1869–1930), a Chicago newspaper and advertising man, and Julia Graham Snitzler.[3]
Mahin attendedHarvard University; while there, he reviewed movies and plays for the BostonAmerican at $30 a week. Mahin worked as a journalist for two years in New York, at theSun, thePost and theCity News. He called this valuable training "because you’ve got to write something every day. Whether you like it or not, you’ve just got to write. Getting your stuff edited, you learn terseness. You realize how important editing is."[4]
Mahin tried to make a living as an actor, starting as a chorus boy in a production of Gilbert and Sullivan'sPatience at the Province Playhouse. "I knew I wasn't good. I quit because other people didn’t think I was good. But, boy, did it get me around the theatre! I learned a lot."[5] He eventually moved into advertising in New York but wrote fiction on the side.[4]
Mahin became friendly withBen Hecht andCharles MacArthur, who he would meet on the ferry while commuting to work in New York. Hecht read Mahin's stories and encouraged him to move to Hollywood.[1]
Hecht and MacArthur were working onThe Unholy Garden (1931) forSam Goldwyn and brought in Mahin to help at $200 a week. Mahin later said "I didn't do a helluva lot of work, because to try to do Ben's work for him is silly. I don’t know why he brought me out. I'd try to work, and he'd say, "No, no," and then he’d sit down and rattle off something."[5]
Nonetheless Heckt liked his work and when Hecht went on to the gangster movieScarface (1932), he took Mahin with him. Mahin wrote the script in collaboration with Hecht,Seton I. Miller and the directorHoward Hawks (W. R. Burnett had done an earlier draft).[6]
It took a while forScarface to be released but advance word was strong and MGM offered Mahin a long-term contract at $200 a week. They assigned him to a gangster film,Beast of the City (1932) which starredJean Harlow. While working on Howard Hawks asked him to do some uncredited work onTiger Shark (1932) at Warner Bros; Mahin did it in the evenings.[7]
Mahin wroteThe Wet Parade (1932) his first movie with directorVictor Fleming. The two men had a huge hit withRed Dust (1932), which helped make a star out ofClark Gable.[8]
Mahin did some work onRasputin and the Empress (1933), thenHell Below (1933) (in which he also appeared as an actor),Bombshell (1933) for Fleming,The Prizefighter and the Lady (1933) andEskimo (1933); Mahin claims to have done some directing on the latter. "I used to go down and direct quite a lot. I did stuff when I was working with [the producer] Hunt Stromberg, because the directors were off on other pictures."[9]
Other credits includedLaughing Boy (1934), which Mahin says he had encouraged MGM to buy and which he described as "awful" disliking the ending and the male star Ramon Navarro.[10] He wroteTreasure Island (1934) for Fleming, andChained (1934). He adapted the operettaNaughty Marietta (1935) and did uncredited work onChina Seas (1935).
Mahin then wroteRiffraff (1936),Wife vs. Secretary (1936),Small Town Girl (1936),The Devil Is a Sissy (1936), andLove on the Run (1936).[11]
He was Oscar nominated for his work onCaptains Courageous (1937) for Fleming. Mahin wroteThe Last Gangster (1937), then did two Gable films,Test Pilot (1938), andToo Hot to Handle (1938). In 1937 MGM paid him $56,000.[12]
With Fleming, Mahin did uncredited work onThe Wizard of Oz (1939) and worked for about a week onGone with the Wind (1939).[13]
Mahin did another for Gable,Boom Town (1940) and was reunited with Fleming onDr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1941). In July 1940 it was reported MGM had paid him $80,833 for the previous year.[14]
He did a gangster film forMervyn LeRoy,Johnny Eager (1941) and some uncredited work on the ending ofWoman of the Year (1942) Mahin adaptedTortilla Flat (1943) and worked on the British filmThe Adventures of Tartu (1943).[15]
Mahin served as a lieutenant in theU.S. Army Air Forces withClark Gable.[16] While serving during World War II, Mahin wroteCombat America (1943), narrated by Gable.
After the war, Mahin did uncredited work onAdventure (1945) for Gable and Fleming, which the writer called "Pretty bad. Very mystical thing. Made a lot of money because it was his first picture since the war."[17] He also worked onThe Yearling (1946) andThe Beginning or the End (1947).[18] He wroteThe Risen Soldier, a biopic ofCardinal Spellman to starVan Johnson that was not used.[19][20]
Over at20th Century Fox he didThat Wonderful Urge (1948),Down to the Sea in Ships (1949),Love That Brute (1950) andPanic in the Streets (1950).
WhenLouis B. Mayer left MGM, Mahin went with him. Mayer put Mahin under personal contract, and would loan him out to studios, including MGM.[21] Mahin called Mayer "the best agent I ever had. Whatever pictures I did after he left, he guaranteed me so much, and he’d lend me out at a big profit. He’d take 20 percent, and he’d still make more than I’d make. People would send me things, I'd knock wood, and they’d send me more things."[22]
Mahin wrote the screenplay forShow Boat (1951), theTechnicolor remake of the noted1927 stage musical, which had previously beenfilmed in 1936. According to musical theatre historianMiles Kreuger in his book,Show Boat: The History of a Classic American Musical, Mahin retained most of the basic structure of the storyline, but little ofOscar Hammerstein II's stage dialogue, preferring to create his own. According to Kreuger, Mahin and producerArthur Freed introduced the plot device of keeping the lovers Magnolia Hawks and Gaylord Ravenal young to the end, rather than having a passage that showed them forty years older, as in the original stage musical.
He wroteQuo Vadis (1951) for MGM andMy Son John (1952) forLeo McCarey. He redid hisRed Dust script asMogambo (1953) for Gable and John Ford, and worked on another melodrama in the tropics,Elephant Walk (1954).
In 1955 a play he wrote with Patsy Ruth Miller,Don Ella, played at UCLA.[23]
Mahin wroteLucy Gallant (1955),The Bad Seed (1956) for LeRoy,Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (1957) for John Huston, andNo Time for Sergeants (1958) for LeRoy.Heaven Knows, Mr Allison earned him another Oscar nomination.
Mahin adaptedPaint Your Wagon for Mayer but plans to film it were dropped when Mayer died.[24] (It would be filmed in 1969 with a fresh script.) Mahin did do some uncredited work on the Cinerama film,South Seas Adventure (1958).[25]
Mahin got to knowMartin Rackin when they worked on a script ofPearl Buck'sLetter from Peking, that was never filmed.[26] They decided to form a production company. Together they wrote and producedThe Horse Soldiers (1959),Revak the Rebel (1959) andNorth to Alaska (1960). The association ended when Rackin was appointed head of Paramount.[27][28]
Mahin's later credits includedThe Spiral Road (1962) andMoment to Moment (1966) for LeRoy. He also wrote episodes ofThe Jimmy Stewart Show (1971–72).
Mahin was a founder of theScreen Writers Guild in 1933. In the late 1930s, he became president of a rival organization, theScreen Playwrights Guild. He rejoined the Guild in 1948 and became its president.[29]
He won theLaurel Award for Screenwriting Achievement in 1958.[1][30]
His second marriage was to silent film actressPatsy Ruth Miller from 1937 until their divorce in 1946.[31] They had one child, Timothy Miller Mahin.[32]
