{{Short description|American dramatist (1912–2000)}} {{Use mdy dates|date=January 2015}} {{Infobox person |name = Lucille Fletcher |image = Lucille-Fletcher-cropped.jpg |caption = Fletcher in 1963 |birth_name = Violet Lucille Fletcher |birth_date = {{Birth date|1912|03|28|mf=y}} |birth_place = [[New York City]], U.S. |death_date = {{Death date and age|2000|08|31|1912|03|28|mf=yes}} |death_place = [[Langhorne, Pennsylvania]], U.S. |body_discovered = |death_cause = |resting_place = |resting_place_coordinates = <!-- {{coord|LAT|LONG|display=inline,title}} --> |other_names = |known_for = {{ubl|''[[The Hitch-Hiker (radio play)|The Hitch-Hiker]]''|''[[Sorry, Wrong Number]]''}} |education = |alma_mater = [[Vassar College]] |employer = |occupation = Writer |years_active = |title = |term = |predecessor = |successor = |party = |opponents = |boards = | spouse = {{plainlist| * {{marriage|[[Bernard Herrmann]]|1939|1948|end=divorced}} * {{marriage|[[Douglass Wallop|John Douglass Wallop III]]|1949|1985|end=died}} }} |partner = |children = 2 |parents = |relations = |callsign = |signature = |website = |footnotes = }}
'''Violet Lucille Fletcher''' (March 28, 1912{{spaced ndash}}August 31, 2000) was an American screenwriter of film, radio and television. Her credits include ''[[The Hitch-Hiker (radio play)|The Hitch-Hiker]],'' an original radio play written for [[Orson Welles]] and adapted for a [[The Hitch-Hiker (The Twilight Zone)|notable episode]] of ''[[The Twilight Zone (1959 TV series)|The Twilight Zone]]'' television series. Lucille Fletcher also wrote ''[[Sorry, Wrong Number#Radio play|Sorry, Wrong Number]]'', one of the most celebrated plays in the history of American radio, which she adapted and expanded for the 1948 [[film noir]] classic [[Sorry, Wrong Number|of the same name]]. Married to composer [[Bernard Herrmann]] in 1939, she wrote the libretto for his opera ''[[Wuthering Heights (Herrmann)|Wuthering Heights]]'', which he began in 1943 and completed in 1951, after their divorce.
==Biography==
===Early life=== Violet Lucille Fletcher was born March 28, 1912, in Brooklyn, New York. Her parents were Matthew Emerson Fletcher, a marine draftsman for the Standard Ship Company (a subsidiary of the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey), and Violet (Anderson) Fletcher.<ref name="Contemporary Authors">Lucille Fletcher Wallop in ''[[Contemporary Authors]] Online''. Gale. August 1, 2001. Retrieved June 18, 2012.</ref>
After attending Public School 164 and the Maxwell Training School, Fletcher went to [[Bay Ridge High School]] and became president of the [[Arista (honor society)|Arista honor society]] and editor of the school magazine. At age 17, she was declared the champion student orator at the regional competition of the National Oratorical Contest on the Constitution of the United States, sponsored by ''[[The New York Times]]'' at [[The Town Hall (New York City)|The Town Hall]] May 17, 1929. The only female finalist in the New York zone, Fletcher received an all-expenses paid trip to South America, a gold medal, a cash prize of $1,000 and an opportunity to compete for the national championship.<ref>"Girl Orator Wins in Regional Finals. Lucille Fletcher of Bay Ridge High School Defeats Seven Boys at Town Hall." ''[[The New York Times]]'', May 18, 1929</ref> Fletcher placed third in the national competition May 25, 1929, judged by five justices of the [[United States Supreme Court]], with an address titled, "The Constitution: A Guarantee of the Personal Liberty of the Individual."<ref>"National Oratory Won By Kansas City Boy." ''[[The Joplin Globe]]'', May 26, 1929</ref><ref>"Missouri Boy First in Oratory Contest." ''[[The New York Times]]'', May 26, 1929</ref>
Fletcher attended [[Vassar College]], where she earned a Bachelor of Arts degree with honors in 1933.<ref name="Contemporary Authors"/><ref name="Sun Obit"/>
===Career=== From 1934 to 1939, Lucille Fletcher worked as a music librarian, copyright clerk and publicity writer at [[CBS]].<ref name="Contemporary Authors"/> There she met her future husband, composer [[Bernard Herrmann]], who conducted the CBS orchestra. The couple dated for five years, but delayed marriage due to her parents' objections. They finally married on October 2, 1939.
Fletcher's first success came when one of her magazine stories, "My Client Curley", was adapted for radio by [[Norman Corwin]]. Broadcast on the ''[[Columbia Workshop]]'' March 7, 1940,<ref name="Goldin Columbia"/> it was later adapted for the 1944 [[Cary Grant]] film, ''[[Once Upon a Time (1944 film)|Once Upon a Time]]''.<ref name="Post obit">Bernstein, Adam, "Lucille Fletcher Dies; Radio Suspense Writer"; ''[[The Washington Post]]'', September 4, 2000</ref>
Herrmann wrote the score for the November 17, 1941, radio debut of Fletcher's famous story, ''[[The Hitch-Hiker (radio play)|The Hitch-Hiker]]'' on ''[[The Orson Welles Show (radio series)|The Orson Welles Show]]''.
Fletcher's greatest success, ''[[Sorry, Wrong Number]]'', premiered on May 25, 1943, as an episode of the radio series ''[[Suspense (radio drama)|Suspense]]''.<ref name="Goldin Suspense"/> [[Agnes Moorehead]] created the role in the first performance and again in several later radio productions. It was broadcast nationwide seven times between 1943 and 1948.<ref name="NYT Obit"/> Fletcher's daughter Dorothy Herrmann told ''[[The New York Times]]'' that Fletcher got the idea for ''Sorry, Wrong Number'' when she was buying food for her sick child at a local grocery on Manhattan's East Side, and a well-dressed woman with an obnoxious manner refused to allow Fletcher to go ahead of her in line. Herrmann described the drama as an "act of revenge".<ref name="NYT Obit">{{cite news |title=Lucille Fletcher, 88, Author Of 'Sorry, Wrong Number' |first=Lawrence |last=Van Gelder |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2000/09/06/arts/lucille-fletcher-88-author-of-sorry-wrong-number.html |newspaper=[[The New York Times]] |date=September 6, 2000 |accessdate=October 14, 2013}}</ref>
[[Barbara Stanwyck]] starred in the 1948 film version of ''Sorry, Wrong Number''. A 1959 version produced for the CBS radio series ''Suspense'' received a 1960 [[Edgar Award]] for Best Radio Drama. Two operas were based on the play,<ref name="NYT Obit"/> which Orson Welles called "the greatest single radio script ever written".<ref>{{cite web|url=https://archive.org/details/OrsonWelles-MercuryTheater-1938Recordings |title=The Hitch-Hiker |publisher=[[The Mercury Summer Theatre of the Air]], June 21, 1943 (at 1:00), at the [[Internet Archive]] |accessdate=2014-08-04}}</ref>
Fletcher adapted the first part of the [[Emily Brontë]] novel ''[[Wuthering Heights]]'' into a libretto for Bernard Herrmann's [[Wuthering Heights (Herrmann)|opera of the same name]], conceived in 1943. He completed the opera in June 1951, by which time they had divorced. Fletcher said the opera was "perhaps the closest to his talent and heart". The work was never produced on stage during Herrmann's lifetime.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.mnopera.org/wp-content/uploads/transfer/1982_original_program_-_wuthering_heights.pdf |title=Wuthering Heights |publisher=Kinkaid, Frank, [[Portland Opera]] Association, 1982 original program archived by [[Minnesota Opera]] |accessdate=2014-08-10}}</ref>
Fletcher is interviewed in the 1992 documentary, ''[[Music for the Movies: Bernard Herrmann]]'', which was [[Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature|nominated]] for an [[65th Academy Awards|Academy Award]].
===Personal life=== Lucille Fletcher and Bernard Herrmann had two daughters, Wendy and Dorothy.<ref name="Contemporary Authors"/> The couple divorced in 1948, over his affair with her cousin, Kathy Lucille (Lucy) Anderson. Anderson and Herrmann were married the following year.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.musicacademyonline.com/composer/biographies.php?bid=107 |title=Bernard Herrmann |publisher=Music Academy Online |accessdate=2014-08-10}}</ref>
Fletcher married [[Douglass Wallop]], a writer, on January 6, 1949.<ref name="Contemporary Authors"/> They remained married until his death in 1985.<ref name="Sun Obit">{{cite news |title=Lucille Fletcher, 88, novelist and writer of radio plays |first=Heather |last=Dewar |url=https://www.baltimoresun.com/2000/09/05/lucille-fletcher-88-novelist-and-writer-of-radio-plays/ |newspaper=[[Baltimore Sun]] |date=September 5, 2000 |access-date=October 14, 2013}}</ref>
Fletcher died of a stroke on August 31, 2000.<ref name="Contemporary Authors"/>
==Works== [[File:Hitch-Hiker Sorry,-Wrong-Number FC.jpg|thumb|''Sorry, Wrong Number'' and ''The Hitch-Hiker'', first published by [[Dramatists Play Service]] in 1952]]
===Radio plays=== *''My Client Curly''. WHP-CBS, March 7, 1940 *''The Man with the One Track Mind''. ''Columbia Workshop'', June 30, 1940.<ref name="Goldin Columbia"/> *''[[Carmilla]]''. ''Columbia Workshop'', July 28, 1940.<ref name="Goldin Columbia"/> *''Alf, The All-American Fly''. ''Columbia Workshop'', September 1, 1940.<ref name="Goldin Columbia">{{cite web|url=https://radiogoldin.library.umkc.edu/Home/RadioGoldin_Records?searchString=The%20Columbia%20Workshop&type=Programs |title=The Columbia Workshop |publisher=RadioGOLDINdex |access-date=2014-08-10}}</ref> *''[[The Hitch-Hiker (radio play)|The Hitch-Hiker]]''. ''[[The Orson Welles Show (radio series)|The Orson Welles Show]]'', November 17, 1941.<ref name="TIOW">[[Orson Welles|Welles, Orson]], and [[Peter Bogdanovich]], edited by [[Jonathan Rosenbaum]], ''[[This is Orson Welles]]''. New York: [[HarperCollins]] Publishers 1992 {{ISBN|0-06-016616-9}}.</ref>{{Rp|367}} *''Someone Else''. ''[[Columbia Workshop]]'', July 20, 1942.<ref name="Goldin Columbia"/> *''Remodeled Brownstone''. ''Columbia Workshop'', October 19, 1942.<ref name="Goldin Columbia"/> *''Gremlins''. ''[[Ceiling Unlimited]]'', December 21, 1942.<ref name="TIOW"/>{{Rp|375}} *''The Diary of Saphronia Winters''. ''Suspense'', April 27, 1943.<ref name="Goldin Suspense"/> *''[[Sorry, Wrong Number]]''. ''[[Suspense (radio drama)|Suspense]]'', May 25, 1943.<ref name="Goldin Suspense">{{cite web|url=https://radiogoldin.library.umkc.edu/Home/RadioGoldin_Records?searchString=Suspense&type=Programs |title=Suspense |publisher=RadioGOLDINdex |access-date=2014-08-10}}</ref> *''Fugue in C Minor''. ''Suspense'', June 1, 1944.<ref name="Goldin Suspense"/> *''The Search for Henri Le Fevre''. ''Suspense'', July 6, 1944.<ref name="Goldin Suspense"/> * ''Night Man''. ''Suspense'', October 26, 1944.<ref name="Goldin Suspense"/> *''The Furnished Floor''. ''Suspense'', September 13, 1945.<ref name="Goldin Suspense"/> *''Dark Journey''. ''Suspense'', April 25, 1946.<ref name="Goldin Suspense"/> *''The Thing in the Window''. ''Suspense'', December 19, 1946.<ref name="Goldin Suspense"/> *''Bela Boczniak's Bad Dreams''. ''[[The Clock (radio)|The Clock]]'', April 25, 1948.<ref name="Goldin Clock">{{cite web|url=https://radiogoldin.library.umkc.edu/Home/RadioGoldin_Records?searchString=The%20Clock&type=Programs |title=The Clock |publisher=RadioGOLDINdex |access-date=2014-08-10}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.digitaldeliftp.com/DigitalDeliToo/dd2jb-The-Clock.html |title=The Clock |publisher=The Digital Deli |accessdate=2014-08-10 |archive-date=September 23, 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150923214838/http://www.digitaldeliftp.com/DigitalDeliToo/dd2jb-The-Clock.html |url-status=dead }}</ref>
===Novels=== *''[[Sorry, Wrong Number]]: A Novelization'', with Allan Ullman. New York: Random House, 1948. OCLC 2312888 *''Night Man'', with Allan Ullman. New York: Random House, 1951. OCLC 1387009 *''The Daughters of Jasper Clay''. New York: Holt, 1958. OCLC 1442341 *''Blindfold''. New York: Random House, 1960. OCLC 1807238 *''And Presumed Dead''. New York: Random House, 1963. OCLC 1439426 *''The Strange Blue Yawl''. New York: Random House, 1964. OCLC 1416360 *''The Girl in Cabin B54''. New York: Random House, 1968. {{ISBN|9780340108086}} *''Night Watch''. New York: Random House, 1972. {{ISBN|9780394482583}} *''Eighty Dollars to Stamford''. New York: Random House, 1975. {{ISBN|9780394475448}} *''Mirror Image''. New York: W. Morrow and Co, 1988. {{ISBN|9780688077495}}
===Plays=== *''Sorry, Wrong Number, and The Hitch-Hiker; Plays in One Act''. [New York]: Dramatists Play Service, 1952. {{ISBN|978-0-8222-1059-7}} *''Night Watch; A Play of Suspense in Two Acts''. [New York]: Dramatists Play Service, 1972. {{ISBN|9780822208266}}. This play was the basis for the film [[Night Watch (1973 film)]].
===Librettos=== *''[[Wuthering Heights (Herrmann)|Wuthering Heights; Opera in 4 Acts and a Prologue]]'', with [[Bernard Herrmann]]. London: Novello, 1965. OCLC 13572509
==Awards== ''Sorry, Wrong Number'' received the [[Edgar Award|Edgar Allan Poe Award]] from the [[Mystery Writers of America]].<ref name="Post obit"/>
==References== {{reflist}}
==External links== {{Commons category|Lucille Fletcher}} * {{IMDb name|282061}} * [https://www.nytimes.com/2000/09/06/arts/lucille-fletcher-88-author-of-sorry-wrong-number.html?scp=1&sq=Lucille%20Fletcher&st=cse Obituary], ''The New York Times'', September 6, 2000 *{{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091027132313/http://geocities.com/Vienna/Stage/1045/Features/Fletcher.html |date=October 27, 2009 |title=Lucille Fletcher: Radio's First Queen of Screams }} *[http://www.escape-suspense.com/2008/03/suspense---the.html ''Suspense'': Diary of Saphronia Winters] *[http://www.escape-suspense.com/2007/10/suspense---fugu.html ''Suspense'': Fugue in C Minor] *[http://www.escape-suspense.com/2007/03/suspense_the_hi.html ''Suspense'': The Hitchhiker] *[https://archive.org/download/SUSPENSE/43-08-21_Sorry_Wrong_Number_2.mp3 ''Suspense'': Sorry, Wrong Number] *[http://www.escape-suspense.com/2007/05/suspense_the_th.html ''Suspense'': The Thing in the Window]
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fletcher, Lucille}} [[Category:1912 births]] [[Category:2000 deaths]] [[Category:American radio writers]] [[Category:American women radio writers]] [[Category:Screenwriters from New York (state)]] [[Category:Edgar Award winners]] [[Category:Writers from Brooklyn]] [[Category:Vassar College alumni]] [[Category:American women screenwriters]] [[Category:Novelists from Pennsylvania]] [[Category:20th-century American women novelists]] [[Category:American opera librettists]] [[Category:Women opera librettists]] [[Category:American women dramatists and playwrights]] [[Category:20th-century American novelists]] [[Category:20th-century American dramatists and playwrights]] [[Category:Novelists from New York (state)]] [[Category:Screenwriters from Pennsylvania]] [[Category:20th-century American screenwriters]] [[Category:Bernard Herrmann]]