Robert Towne
Biography
Robert Towne (born Robert Bertram Schwartz; November 23, 1934 - July 1, 2024) was an American screenwriter, producer, director and actor. He was part of the New Hollywood wave of filmmaking. He is best known for his Academy Award-winning original screenplay for Roman Polanski's Chinatown (1974), which is widely considered one of the greatest screenplays ever written. He later said it was inspired by a chapter in Carey McWilliams's Southern California Country: An Island on the Land (1946) and a West magazine article on Raymond Chandler's Los Angeles. Towne also wrote the sequel, The Two Jakes (1990); the Hal Ashby comedy-dramas The Last Detail (1973) and Shampoo (1975); and the first two Mission: Impossible films.
Towne directed the sports dramas Personal Best (1982) and Without Limits (1998), the crime thriller Tequila Sunrise (1988), and the romantic crime drama Ask the Dust (2006).
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Acting (17 movies)
Creature from the Haunted Sea
1961
Last Woman on Earth
1960
Drive, He Said
1971
Revolution! The Making of 'Bonnie and Clyde'
2008
Budd Boetticher: A Man Can Do That
2005
Shampoo
1975
Suspect Zero
2004
What She Said: The Art of Pauline Kael
2019
The Pick-up Artist
1987
Cadillac Desert: Water and the Transformation of Nature
1997
The Zodiac Killer
1971
Billy Wilder: The Human Comedy
1998
A Sad Flower in the Sand
2001
Salinger
2013
Rescued from the Closet
2001
You Must Remember This: The Warner Bros. Story
2008
A Decade Under the Influence
2003
Directing (4 movies)
| Title | Year | Job |
|---|---|---|
| Last Woman on Earth | 1960 | Screenplay |
| The Tomb of Ligeia | 1964 | Screenplay |
| Villa Rides | 1968 | Screenplay |
| The Last Detail | 1973 | Screenplay |
| Chinatown | 1974 | Writer |
| The Yakuza | 1974 | Screenplay |
| Shampoo | 1975 | Writer |
| Personal Best | 1982 | Producer |
| Personal Best | 1982 | Writer |
| Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes | 1984 | Writer |
| 8 Million Ways to Die | 1986 | Writer |
| The Bedroom Window | 1987 | Executive Producer |
| Tequila Sunrise | 1988 | Screenplay |
| Days of Thunder | 1990 | Screenplay |
| The Two Jakes | 1990 | Writer |
| The Firm | 1993 | Screenplay |
| Love Affair | 1994 | Screenplay |
| Mission: Impossible | 1996 | Screenplay |
| Without Limits | 1998 | Writer |
| Mission: Impossible II | 2000 | Screenplay |
| Ask the Dust | 2006 | Screenplay |