Preston Sturges Preston Sturges Preston Sturges (; born Edmund Preston Biden; August 29, 1898 – August 6, 1959) was an American playwright, screenwriter, and film director. In 1941, he won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for the film "The Great McGinty", his first of three nominations in the category. Sturges took the screwball comedy format of the 1930s to another level, writing dialogue that, heard today, is often surprisingly naturalistic, mature, and ahead of its time, despite the farcical situations. It is not uncommon for a Sturges character to deliver an exquisitely turned phrase and take an elaborate pratfall within
Preston Sturges would be surprising if I weren't. Sturges married four times and had three sons: Sturges died of a heart attack at the Algonquin Hotel while writing his autobiography (which, ironically, he'd intended to title "The Events Leading Up to My Death"), and was interred in the Ferncliff Cemetery in Hartsdale, New York. His book, "Preston Sturges by Preston Sturges: His Life in His Words", was published in 1990 by Simon & Schuster. In 1975, he became the first writer to be given the Screen Writers Guild's Laurel Award posthumously. He has a star dedicated to him on the Hollywood Walk