Ernest Vajda(1886-1954)
- Writer
- Script and Continuity Department
The Hungarian playwright and novelist Ernest Vajda was educated at a
monastic college in Paps, where he graduated with a degree in
electrochemistry in 1904. He added a Ph.D. to his name in 1908 and
produced his first play the following year. Vajda held several
editorial jobs in Hungary before moving to the United States, settling
down in Beverly Hills and joining Paramount as a contract writer in
1925. He was chiefly associated with comedies starring
Adolphe Menjou, and, from 1929,
collaborated on several films -- noted for their continental
sophistication -- with the director
Ernst Lubitsch (their most celebrated
effort was the classic musical comedy
Parade d'amour (1929)).
Vajda also continued to write plays for the Broadway stage, including the comedy "Fata Morgana", which was aired twice (in 1924 and in 1931). He moved to MGM in 1932, where he stayed for six years, working in collaboration on lavish period dramas like Miss Barrett (1934) and Marie-Antoinette (1938). Though he authored no further screenplays after 1941, he contributed original material to the John Philip Sousa biopic La parade de la gloire (1952).
Vajda also continued to write plays for the Broadway stage, including the comedy "Fata Morgana", which was aired twice (in 1924 and in 1931). He moved to MGM in 1932, where he stayed for six years, working in collaboration on lavish period dramas like Miss Barrett (1934) and Marie-Antoinette (1938). Though he authored no further screenplays after 1941, he contributed original material to the John Philip Sousa biopic La parade de la gloire (1952).
