Peter Viertel(1920-2007)
- Writer
Peter Viertel, a WWII veteran whose first novel was published to
glowing reviews when he was only 18, was born of parents of the
European intelligentsia, refugees from
Adolf Hitler's Europe. Brought up in
Hollywood, in a household where Greta Garbo
(his mother's closest friend),
Bertolt Brecht
Thomas Mann,
Heinrich Mann and
Franz Werfel were constant guests, young
Peter yearned to be an American. In need of money to be able to
continue writing his novels and to support his first wife, Jigee,
Viertel turned to writing scripts for Hollywood, where he soon found
himself in the orbit of John Huston,
the legendary director of
The Maltese Falcon (1941).
Peter died in Marbella, Spain, nineteen days following the death of his
second wife, actress Deborah Kerr.
