26 Facts About Sidney Sheldon

1.

Sidney Sheldon was prominent in the 1930s, first working on Broadway plays, and then in motion pictures, notably writing the successful comedy The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer, which earned him an Oscar in 1948.

2.

Sidney Sheldon went on to work in television, where over twenty years he created The Patty Duke Show, I Dream of Jeannie, and Hart to Hart.

3.

Sidney Sheldon is consistently cited as one of the top-10 best-selling fiction writers of all time.

4.

At 10, Sidney Sheldon made his first sale, US$5 for a poem.

5.

Sidney Sheldon had to drop out after six months during the Depression era to help support his family.

6.

Sidney Sheldon enlisted in the military during World War II as a pilot in the War Training Service, a branch of the Army Air Corps.

7.

Sidney Sheldon's unit was disbanded, but he was discharged because of a recurring slipped disc before he was deployed.

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8.

In 1937, Sidney Sheldon moved to Hollywood, where he reviewed scripts and collaborated on a number of B movies.

9.

Sidney Sheldon began writing musicals for the Broadway stage while continuing to write screenplays for both MGM Studios and Paramount Pictures.

10.

Sidney Sheldon earned a reputation as a prolific writer; for example, at one time, he and Ben Roberts had three musicals on Broadway - a rewritten The Merry Widow, Jackpot, and Dream with Music.

11.

Sidney Sheldon received a Tony Award in 1959 for his musical Redhead, starring Gwen Verdon.

12.

Sidney Sheldon was one of the writers on the screenplay for the 1948 musical film Easter Parade and sole writer for the 1950 musical film Annie Get Your Gun, both of which featured the songs of Irving Berlin.

13.

When television became the new popular medium, Sidney Sheldon decided to try his hand in it.

14.

In 1965, Sidney Sheldon created, produced, and wrote I Dream of Jeannie starring Barbara Eden and Larry Hagman.

15.

Sidney Sheldon wrote all but two dozen scripts in five years, sometimes using three pseudonyms while simultaneously writing scripts for The Patty Duke Show.

16.

Sidney Sheldon later said that he did this because he felt his name was appearing too often in the credits as creator, producer, copyright owner and writer of these series.

17.

In 1970, Sidney Sheldon wrote all 17 episodes of the short-lived series Nancy.

18.

In 1979, Sidney Sheldon created and wrote for the series Hart to Hart starring Robert Wagner and Stefanie Powers.

19.

In 1969, Sidney Sheldon wrote his first novel, The Naked Face, which earned him a nomination for the Edgar Allan Poe Award from the Mystery Writers of America in the category of Best First Novel.

20.

Sidney Sheldon was married for 30 years to Jorja Curtright, a stage and film actress who later became an interior designer.

21.

Sidney Sheldon married Alexandra Joyce Kostoff, a former child actress in Las Vegas in 1989.

22.

Sidney Sheldon struggled with bipolar disorder for years; he contemplated suicide at 17, as detailed in his autobiography published in 2005, The Other Side of Me.

23.

Sidney Sheldon's remains were cremated, the ashes interred in Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery.

24.

Sidney Sheldon won an Academy Award for Writing Original Screenplay for The Bachelor and the Bobby-Soxer, a Tony Award for his musical Redhead, and was nominated for an Emmy Award for his work on I Dream of Jeannie, an NBC sitcom.

25.

Sidney Sheldon was inducted into the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1988 had a Golden Palm Star on the Palm Springs Walk of Stars dedicated to him in 1994.

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26.

In 1990, Sidney Sheldon received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement.