Ivan Moffat

Ivan Romilly Moffat (18 February 1918 – 4 July 2002) was a British screenwriter, film producer and socialite who, with Fred Guiol, was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for adapting Edna Ferber's eponymous novel into the film Giant. Moffat was the grandson of actor-manager Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree.

After studying at the London School of Economics, Moffat became a socialite and began to make films to promote the war effort. During World War II he filmed activities of the US Army, meeting director George Stevens, whom he soon followed to Hollywood and assisted at Paramount Pictures. In the 1950s, between his two marriages, Moffat had a string of love affairs, notably with Elizabeth Taylor and Lady Caroline Blackwood. Beginning in 1956 he wrote or co-wrote screenplays for a number of well-known films, in addition to Giant, and in the 1970s wrote for television.

Early life Ivan Moffat was born in Havana, Cuba, the son of the British actress and poet Iris Tree and her American husband, artist and photographer Curtis Moffat. He was the grandson of actor-manager Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree. The family lived, among other places, in America and Australia, and moved to London when Moffat was 8 years old. There, Moffat attended Dartington Hall School, in Totnes, Devon, befriending Michael Young. Moffat then studied at the London School of Economics. As an undergraduate, he joined the Communist Party, which caused him later to be blacklisted for a time in Hollywood. Jessica Mitford once described Moffat as "spanning the gap between Left-wing politics and the deb dance scene".

Film and television After the war, Moffat settled in Hollywood, joining Stevens as an assistant producer at Liberty Films, which was soon purchased by Paramount Pictures.

Among other screenplays that Moffat wrote or co-wrote were The Wayward Bus and Boy on a Dolphin (both 1957), They Came to Cordura (1959), Tender Is the Night (1962), The Heroes of Telemark and The Greatest Story Ever Told (both 1965), and Black Sunday (1977), as well as revising the screenplay for The Great Escape (1963) and The Chase (1966). He had a brief affair with Elizabeth Taylor during the filming of A Place in the Sun. During the marriage, the couple moved back to London when Moffat was hired to "doctor" the screenplay for The Great Escape (1963), and partly so his wife could fulfil her responsibilities as lady-in-waiting to the Queen Mother. With Katharine, he had two sons.

Moffat died on 4 July 2002, aged 84, in Los Angeles, California.