(1949), an adaptation of Alexander Pushkin's short story. Ackland intended to direct the film, but fell out with the producer Anatole de Grunwald and star Anton Walbrook. Thorold Dickinson took over at short notice and rewrote Ackland's script with the help of de Grunwald. Assisted by a co-author Elspeth Grant, Ackland wrote his memoirs, The Celluloid Mistress, or The Custard Pie of Dr. Caligari, published by Alan Wingate in London in 1954. Plays Improper People (1929) Marion Ella and Dance With No Music (1930) Strange Orchestra (1931) Ballerina, adapted from Eleanor Smith's novel (1933) Birthday (1934) The Old Ladies, adapted from Hugh Walpole's 1924 novel (1935) After October and Plot Twenty-One (1936) Yes, My Darling Daughter, an English version of the American comedy by Mark Reed (1937) The White Guard, adapted from the Russian of Mikhail Bulgakov (1938) Remembrance of Things Past (1938) Sixth Floor, an English version of the play by Alfred Gehri (1939) Blossom Time, with music by Franz Schubert (1942) The Dark River (1943) Crime and Punishment, adapted from Dostoevsky (1946) Diary of a Scoundrel or Too Clever By Half, adapted from Alexander Ostrovsky, (1948) Before the Party, adapted from the story by W. Somerset Maugham (1949) The Pink Room, or The Escapists (1945, first staged in 1952), rewritten as Absolute Hell (1987) A Dead Secret (1957) Farewell, Farewell Eugene, adapted from John Vari's original play (1959) Selected filmography Shadows (1931) Keep Smiling (1938) Under Your Hat (1940) References Who's Who in the Theatre 17th edition, Gale 1981, (for Ackland's own authoritative CV) The Oxford Companion to English Literature, ed Margaret Drabble, OUP 1995 The Oxford Companion to Twentieth-Century Literature in English, ed Jenny Stringer, OUP 1996 Terence Rattigan, a Biography by Geoffrey Wansell, Fourth Estate 1995 A Dictionary of Writers and Their Work by Michael Cox, OUP 2002 The Macmillan International Film Encyclopedia by Ephraim Katz, Macmillan 1994 Halliwell's Film, Video and DVD Guide, by John Walker, HarperCollins 2004 Theatre Record (archived reviews of Absolute Hell 1988 and 1995) J. C. Trewin and Wendy Trewin The Arts Theatre, London, 1927-1981, 1986 . Notes External links Alumni of the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama English male screenwriters English film directors English people of Polish-Jewish descent English Jewish writers 1908 births 1991 deaths 20th-century English dramatists and playwrights English male dramatists and playwrights 20th-century English male writers 20th-century English screenwriters