2002 Award Recipient

Blake Edwards, whose more than 50-year screenwriting career includes such classics as the Pink Panther movies, S.O.B., 10 and Victor/Victoria, will be this year’s recipient of the Screen Laurel Award presented by the Writers Guild of America, west at its annual awards show in March.

The Laurel Award is given to that member of the Guild who has "advanced the literature of the motion picture through the years, and who has made outstanding contributions to the profession of the screen writer."

"I’m delighted that Blake Edwards is this year’s Screen Laurel recipient," said Victoria Riskin, President of the Writers Guild of America, west. "What could be better, during a time when laughter is so desperately needed, than to honor one of film’s great comic screenwriters? The Guild is proud to present Blake Edwards with this lifetime achievement honor."

Blake Edwards was born William Blake Crump in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 1922. When he was four years old, his mother moved to California and married an assistant director and production manager named Jack McEdward, son of a well-known silent film director J. Gordon Edwards.

Young Blake Edwards, as he became, was soon writing scripts for low-budget films, such as Panhandle (1948) and Stampede (1949), as well as radio scripts, in particular the successful detective show Richard Diamond, Private Detective. By the 1950s, he continued to write films, such as the successful My Sister Eileen (1954), began writing for television shows like Four Star Theater and the hit series Peter Gunn and Mr. Lucky, and was starting to direct film and television.

In 1993, Blake Edwards received the prestigious Preston Sturges Award, given jointly by the Writers Guild of America, west and the Directors Guild of America. The award has been given only three times over the years, to Richard Brooks, Billy Wilder and Blake Edwards.

As a writer, Edwards has been nominated for seven Writers Guild Awards, winning two, for The Pink Panther Strikes Again (1976) and Victor/Victoria (1981). His other Writers Guild Award nominations were for S.O.B. (1980), 10 (1979), The Return of the Pink Panther (1974), The Great Race (1965) and The Pink Panther (1964). For Victor/Victoria, Edwards received an Academy Award nomination for Best Adapted Screenplay, and he was nominated for an Emmy for writing The Kill, an episode of Peter Gunn in 1959.

Some of his European awards include the French Legion of Honor, French Commandeur De L’Ordre Des Arts Et Des Lettres, the French Cesar, the Italian David di Donatello Award, and the Italian Premio Filmcritica "Maetri del Cinema Campidoglio" Award.

Aside from his writing, directing and producing, Edwards also paints and sculpts, but considers his 35-year marriage to his wife, Julie Andrews, his greatest achievement.