Name Anthony Shaffer | Role Playwright | |
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Occupation Playwright, screenwriter, novelist, barrister, advertising executive Books The Wicker Man, Withered Murder, This savage parade Movies The Wicker Man, Sleuth, Frenzy, Death on the Nile, Evil Under the Sun, Murder on the Orient Express, Sommersby Plays Similar People | ||
Anthony Joshua Shaffer (15 May 1926 – 6 November 2001) was an English playwright, screenwriter, novelist, barrister and advertising executive.
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Early life
Shaffer was born to a Jewish family in Liverpool, the son of Reka (née Fredman) and Jack Shaffer, who was an estate agent with his wife's family. He was the identical twin brother of writer and dramatist Peter Shaffer, and they had another brother, Brian. He graduated with a law degree from Trinity College, Cambridge.
Career
Shaffer's most notable work was the play Sleuth (1970), which he adapted for the film version which starred Laurence Olivier and Michael Caine, and was Oscar nominated. He received Edgar Awards from the Mystery Writers of America for both versions: for Best Play in 1971, and Best Screenplay in 1973.
His other major screenplays include the Hitchcock thriller Frenzy (1972) and the British cult thriller The Wicker Man (1973) with whose director, Robin Hardy, Shaffer had previously set up a television production company Hardy, Shaffer & Associates.
Personal
Shaffer was married three times—to Henrietta Glaskie, Carolyn Soley, and Diane Cilento—and with Soley had two children, Claudia and Cressida. His third wife was the Australian actress Diane Cilento, whom he met in 1973 when she appeared in The Wicker Man. He moved to Queensland before he married Cilento in 1985, and he was legally domiciled in Australia, although he maintained a flat in Chelsea for his family. This became an issue after his death, when his partner, Jojo Capece-Minutolo, made a claim on his estate in the British High Court, arguing that he had intended to divorce Cilento and marry her and that he had given her an engagement ring. The British judge found that despite Shaffer being in "an intimate and loving relationship" with Ms Capece in London, Shaffer and his estate were not legally domiciled in the United Kingdom at the time of his death and that therefore Ms Capece-Minutolo had no claims on his estate other than any bequest in Shaffer's will.