Robert Towne

Robert Towne (born Robert Bertram Schwartz, November 23, 1934) is 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). 2Early life Towne was born in Los Angeles, where he grew up in San Pedro, the son of Helen and Lou Schwartz.Towne's parentage was Romanian on his father’s side, Russian on his mother’s; the family was Jewish.He graduated from Pomona College in Claremont, California. 2Career 3Roger Corman Towne originally sought work as a writer and actor. He did an acting class with Roger Corman taught by Jeff Corey where his classmates also included Jack Nicholson, Irving Kershner and Sally Kellerman.Corman was renowned for giving work to untested people of talent. Towne wrote the screenplay for the Corman-financed Last Woman on Earth (1960), in which Towne also played one of the lead role