(Films released from August 1, 1929 through July 31, 1930 were eligible.)
The nominees were ...
- George Abbott, Maxwell Anderson, and Del Andrews, All Quiet on the Western Front
- Howard Estabrook, Street of Chance
- Julian Josephson, Disraeli
- Frances Marion, The Big House
- John Meehan, The Divorcee
... when they should have been ...
- George Abbott, Maxwell Anderson, and Del Andrews, All Quiet on the Western Front
- Howard Estabrook, Street of Chance
- George S. Kaufman and Morrie Ryskind, The Cocoanuts
- Frances Marion, The Big House
- John Meehan, The Divorcee
And the Oscar went to ...
Frances Marion, The Big House. Marion was the first woman to win an Oscar for something other than acting, but she was a born pioneer: During World War I she was one of the first female war correspondents. She became an extraordinarily prolific and well-paid screenwriter in the silent era and moved easily into sound, though her career tapered off in the later thirties. At the time of The Big House, a behind-the-bars prison melodrama that practically invented the genre and its clichés, she was married to George Hill, the film's director. They divorced in 1933.
... when it should have gone to ...
 |
| George S. Kaufman |
 |
| Morrie Ryskind |
 |
| The Cocoanuts |
The Marx Brothers' first feature was an adaptation by Ryskind of their stage play, which had been written by Kaufman, one of the few writers who understood the Marxes' brand of humor and could provide set-ups for their extended riffs. The Cocoanuts contains the famous "viaduct / why a duck?" routine between Groucho and Chico. Kaufman wrote few screenplays himself, one of the notable exceptions being A Night at the Opera (1935), but most of the plays he wrote for the stage were adapted for the movies, and he was sometimes called on to contribute dialogue for them and other films. Ryskind was a frequent collaborator with Kaufman on stage productions, including the Pulitzer Prize-winning musical Of Thee I Sing. He received Oscar nominations for My Man Godfrey (1936) and for the adaptation of Kaufman's play (with Edna Ferber), Stage Door (1937). (Kaufman was so startled by the changes made to his play that he said it should have been called "Screen Door.") In the 1930s, Ryskind had been involved with leftist causes, but when Franklin D. Roosevelt ran for a third term in 1940, he supported the Republican opponent, Wendell Wilkie, and began a move to the right. In 1947 he testified as a "friendly witness" about communist activity in Hollywood before the House Un-American Activities Committee. Ryskind claimed that this made him persona non grata in Hollywood, and he never wrote for film again. He helped William F. Buckley found the National Review, and in 1960 he became a conservative columnist for the Los Angeles Times.
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