Background

John Monk Saunders was born on November 22, 1897, in Hinckley, Minnesota, United States. He was the son of Robert Chancellor and Nancy (Monk) Saunders.

Education

Saunders participated in World War I as a pilot in the U.S. Flying Corps and became a flight instructor. After the war, he attended the University of Washington, became a Rhodes scholar, and earned a master’s degree from Oxford University in 1923.

Career

Saunders returned to the United States to work as a journalist for several New York papers and contributed stories to magazines such as Cosmopolitan and Liberty. Two of his early stories were bought by the Famous Players-Lasky production company and became the films Too Many Kisses (1925), which is about a wealthy young man who is sued for breach of promise, and Tiie Shock Punch (1925), which concerns a rich man who poses as a boxer. Saunders next proposed a film project to Jesse L. Lasky based on his unfinished novel, Wings, the story of two American pilots fighting in France during World War I. Lasky bought the screen rights for the unpublished novel for the unprecedented sum of $39,000 and hired William Wellman to direct a cast that included Charles “Buddy” Rogers and Richard Arlen as the American pilots, Clara Bow as the girl they both love, and a supporting cast of 3,500 servicemen and pilots on loan from the U.S. War Department. The film was an outstanding success, both critically and popularly, and won the first Academy Award ever presented for Best Picture in 1927-28. Saunders’ book was published after the release of the film and included stills from motion picture.

In 1928 Saunders saw his story and scenario for a sequel to Wings sold. Legion of the Condemned was directed by Wellmann for Paramount Famous-Lasky, and it starred Gary Cooper, who had a cameo in the earlier picture, and the actress Fay Wray, whom Saunders met on the set and soon married. Saunders’ next film work was the story “The Dockwalloper,” which became the film The Docks of New York, the tale of a stoker on a tramp steamer who marries a waterfront doxy while on shore leave.

Achievements

• John Monk Saunders was a screenwriter who is best remembered for the novel Wings, which, in its film incarnation, won the first Academy Award ever presented for Best Picture of 1927-28. Most of Saunders’ screenplays grew out of his experiences as a pilot during World War I, and exhibit both a pacifistic stance toward war and an understanding of the deep emotions and camaraderie experienced by men during wartime.
  
  Saunders won an Academy Award for Best Original Story for the 1930 film The Dawn Patrol, another work set among pilots during World War I, but this time featuring upper-class Englishmen who endure the grim hardships of war. However, his films are remembered as much for their quiet moments of genuine emotion as for their scenes of action-packed drama.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Single Lady

    (A montage of World War I and Amer­icans in Paris in the 1...)

    1931
  • Wings 1927

• movie

  • Devil Dogs of the Air

    (James Cagney stars as a wise-guy flyer who's ready to ste...)

    1935
  • The Shock Punch 1925
  • Docks of New York 1928
  • She Goes to War 1929
  • Dawn Patrol 1930
  • The Finger Points 1931
  • The Last Flight 1931
  • The Eagle and the Hawk 1933
  • Ace of Aces 1933
  • I Found Stella Parish 1936
  • The Conquest Of The Air 1936
  • Yank at Oxford 1938

Views

Much of John's work for the screen demonstrates a strong pacifist philosophy; he obviously glories in the comradeship that war can offer a man, but does not overlook the harsh realities of war.

Personality

Saunders has often been quoted for stating that the most important element in writing for the screen is “Action! Action! Action!”.

Saunders died in 1940, shortly after Fay Wray filed for divorce, citing his alcohol and drug use as the cause. He hung himself in his home in Fort Myers, Florida, leaving no note.

Connections

In 1922, Saunders married Avis Hughes, but they divorced in 1927. On June 15, 1927, John married Fay Wray, an actress, in 1928. In 1939, their marriage ended a divorce. Saunders had one daughter.

Father:

Robert Chancellor Saunders

Mother:

Nancy (Monk) Saunders

ex-wife:

Avis Hughes

Wife:

Vina Fay Wray

September 15, 1907 – August 8, 2004

Vina Fay Wray was a Canadian-American actress most noted for starring as Ann Darrow in the 1933 film King Kong.

Daughter:

Susan Cary Saunders (Riskin)

Friend:

Gary Cooper

May 7, 1901 – May 13, 1961

Frank James Cooper was an American actor.

References

• DLB 26: American Screenwriters, First Series Screenwriters, once only needed to provide continuity and dialogue in the form of title cards for silent movies, achieved true prominence with the advent of sound in 1927.
  1984
• International Dictionary of Films and Filmmakers
  1933