Reginald Rose
Author of "12 Angry Men"
Biography
Conclusion
Reginald Rose
Reginald Rose died in 2002 at the age of 82.
- Born on December 10, 1920 to William (a lawyer) and Alice Rose
- Born in Manhattan, New York
- Attended Townsend High School and briefly attended City College
- Was inspired to enlist in the U.S. Army after Pearl Harbor
- Served from 1942-46 and became a first lieutenant
- Rose was married twice, to Barbara Langbart in 1943, with whom he had four children, and to Ellen McLaughlin in 1963, with whom he had two children
- He died in 2002 from complications of heart failure.
Career
- Rose received an Emmy for his teleplay and an Oscar nomination for its 1957 feature-length film adaptation.
- He wrote for all three of the major broadcast networks of the 1950-80 period.
- In addition, he created and wrote for The Defenders in 1961, a weekly courtroom drama spun off from one of Rose's episodes of Studio One
- The Defenders would go on to win two Emmy awards for dramatic writing.
- Rose became known for his themes of controversial social and political issues. His realism helped create the slice-of-life television drama which was influential in the anthology programs of the late 1950s.
Television
More about 12 Angry Men
- He sold his first teleplay, "Bus to Nowhere," in 1950 to the live CBS dramatic anthology program Studio One, for which he wrote "Twelve Angry Men" four years later.
- This drama was inspired by Rose's service on trial similar to the case he wrote about in his play.
- Rose has said the following about his memories of this experience:
"It was such an impressive, solemn setting in a great big wood-paneled courtroom, with a silver-haired judge, it knocked me out. I was overwhelmed. I was on a jury for a manslaughter case, and we got into this terrific, furious, eight-hour argument in the jury room. I was writing one-hour dramas for Studio One then, and I thought, wow, what a setting for a drama."
- Twelve Angry Men was remade for television in 1997. In that version of the play, the judge was a woman and four of the jurors were black, but most of the action and dialogue was retained. The play was once also produced with an all-female cast.
- In fact, Twelve Angry Men was originally written by Rose as a one-hour teleplay for Studio One. The strength of the teleplay led to Heny Fonda co-producing the screenplay with Rose in 1957. The stage play was first produced in 1964 with revised versions in 1966 and 2004. In 1997 the play was filmed for Showtime.