John Howard Lawson

In 1947, Lawson was one of the Hollywood Ten, the initial group of American film industry professionals to appear before Congress as part of an investigation into communist influence in Hollywood. Because he and the other nine screenwriters and directors refused to answer questions about their alleged Communist Party affiliation, they were cited for contempt of Congress. In 1948, Lawson was sentenced to a year in prison; he began serving in 1950. When he got out, he like the others found himself blacklisted by the studios. He wrote, uncredited, the screenplay for ''Cry, the Beloved Country'' (1951), an adaptation of Alan Paton's anti-apartheid novel about South Africa. With his Hollywood livelihood largely cut off, Lawson turned his attention to scholarship. He taught at several California universities. He authored books about drama, film-making, and cultural history. Unlike other members of the Hollywood Ten, Lawson was never "un-blacklisted". He remained a pariah in the film industry until his death in 1977. Provided by Wikipedia