Academic

Horton Hears A Mockingbird

By Tim Zinnecker

Award-winning storyteller Horton Foote died earlier this week at the age of 92.  Foote, who won a Pulitzer Prize in 1995 for The Young Man From Atlanta, is perhaps best known to those of us in the legal profession for writing the screenplay for To Kill A Mockingbird.

In his honor, I offer up these ten trivia questions (answers below the fold).

1.  What is the first name of Harper Lee, the author of To Kill A Mockingbird?

2.  Where did Harper Lee study law?

3.  Name one of the early working titles of To Kill A Mockingbird.

4.  On whom did Lee base her character, Atticus Finch?

5.  What is the origin of the name, ?Atticus Finch??

6.  Name the two other actors who were offered the role of Atticus Finch before Universal Pictures selected Gregory Peck.

7.  Which actor / actress from To Kill A Mockingbird delivered a eulogy at Gregory Peck?s funeral?

8.  True or False: To Kill A Mockingbird won the Oscar for Best Picture (1962).

9.  True or False: Gregory Peck won the Oscar for Best Actor for his portrayal of Atticus Finch.

10.  Horton Foote won an Oscar for writing the screenplay for To Kill A Mockingbird.  Later, he won an Oscar for writing the screenplay for another film.  Name the other film, and the actor / actress who connects both movies.

1.  Lee?s first name is Nelle, her grandmother?s name spelled backward.  (source)

2.  Lee studied law at the University of Alabama in the late 1940?s and greatly disliked the experience.  (I have to assume that Lounge co-hosts Dan Filler and Al Brophy had not yet arrived in Tuscaloosa.)  (source:  same as #1)

3.  Early working titles included ?Go Set a Watchman? and ?Atticus.?  (source:  same as #1)

4.  Lee based the character of Atticus Finch on her father, Amasa Coleman Lee, a lawyer who once unsuccessfully defended a black man and his son accused of murdering a white shopkeeper.  (source:  same as #1)

5.  Lee borrowed the first name, ?Atticus,? from Cicero?s friend, Titus Pomponius Atticus, and she used her mother?s maiden name, ?Finch,? as his last.  (source:  same as #1; and this)

6.  Rock Hudson and Jimmy Stewart were offered the role before Gregory Peck.  (source)

7.  Brock Peters, who portrayed Tom Robinson, the falsely-accused defendant represented by Atticus Finch.  (source:  same as #6)

8.  False.  The five films nominated as ?Best Picture? of 1962 were Lawrence of Arabia (winner), The Longest Day, The Music Man, Mutiny on the Bounty, and To Kill A Mockingbird.  (source)

9.  True.  The other four nominees were Burt Lancaster (Birdman of Alcatraz), Jack Lemmon (Days of Wine and Roses), Marcello Mastroianni (Divorce - Italian Style), and Peter O'Toole (Lawrence of Arabia).  (source:  same as #8)  Peck was a Best Actor nominee on four other occasions (all for earlier work), but To Kill A Mockingbird was his only win.  (source)

10.  Foote won the Oscar for writing the script for Tender Mercies, which also brought Robert Duvall his only Oscar for Best Actor.  Duvall?s first role in film?  Boo Radley, in To Kill a Mockingbird (as I recall, seen only for a moment, standing behind a door).  (source and source)

Full post as published by The Faculty Lounge on March 06, 2009 (boomark / email).