Biography
Albert Maltz, an award-winning short-story writer, novelist and screenwriter was one of the “Hollywood Ten,” the screenwriters, directors and producers who in October 1947 were subpoenaed before the House Un-American Activities Committee at the outset of its investigation into alleged Communist influence in the motion-picture industry. All ten refused to answer the committee’s central question — “Are you now, or have you ever been, a member of the Communist Party?” — arguing that the inquiry violated their First Amendment rights of belief and association. On November 24, 1947 the House cited them for contempt of Congress; they were convicted the following year, and after John Howard Lawson’s and Trumbo’s appeals failed as test cases and the Supreme Court declined to hear them in 1950, all ten served federal prison terms. Every one of them was blacklisted by the studios under the “Waldorf Statement.” Blacklisted after his release, he lived and worked for years in exile in Mexico and did not receive open screen credit again until the 1970s.
Joseph Freeman’s review in the December 2, 1933 Daily Worker identifies Maltz and George Sklar as authors of Peace on Earth, the Theatre Union’s first production, which opened at the Civic Repertory Theatre that week. Freeman describes its antiwar and labor-defense themes and evaluates the staging. This documents Maltz’s theater work before the Hollywood Ten prosecution. The professor’s murder frame-up and hanging are fictional plot events, not a real additional prisoner case. Source: https://www.marxists.org/history/usa/pubs/dailyworker/1933/v10-n289-dec-02-1933-DW-LOC.pdf#page=7
The Militant, March 25, 1977, page 23: Maltz signed the open letter published in the Los Angeles Times March 2, 1977 condemning persecution of Charter 77 advocates in Czechoslovakia. He told Harry Ring that his own witch-hunt imprisonment informed this position. This documents later political activity and retrospective testimony, without supplying another arrest or jail interval. Source: https://www.themilitant.com/1977/4111/MIL4111.pdf#page=23
The dictionary records Maltz’s studies at Columbia and Yale and describes his writing as using working-class themes. It notes his settlement in Mexico City after the McCarthy-era indictment. The entry corroborates the birth and death dates already recorded here and does not establish a separate case or additional custody interval.
Jacob Rader Marcus, editor, and Judith M. Daniels, associate editor, The Concise Dictionary of American Jewish Biography, printed page 412 (PDF page 411).
