Max Ehrlich
Max Simon Ehrlich was an American writer, born in 1909, known for his contributions to radio and television as well as his novels. He began his career writing for radio serials, including the notable series "The Shadow," before transitioning to television in the 1950s. His television credits comprise a variety of series, such as "Navy Log," "The Defenders," and "Star Trek." Ehrlich's early literary works were marked by ambition and controversy; for instance, his novel "The Big Eye" (1947) explored themes of global unity against a planetary threat. While he later produced more conventional crime fiction, he also sought to integrate political themes, as seen in "Deep Is the Blue" (1964), which dealt with nuclear tensions. Throughout his career, much of his fiction was tied to the film industry, including novelizations like "The Edict" (1974) and "The Reincarnation of Peter Proud" (1974). He also delved into alarmist themes surrounding societal issues, such as population growth and cult dynamics, in several of his works. Ehrlich passed away in 1983, leaving behind a diverse body of work that reflected the cultural anxieties of his time.
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Max Ehrlich
Writer
- Born: October 10, 1909
- Birthplace: Springfield, Massachusetts
- Died: 1983
Biography
The American writer Max Simon Ehrlich—not to be confused with the famous German cabaret artist, actor, director, and screenwriter Max Ehrlich, who died in Auschwitz—was born in 1909. He first made an impact as a writer for radio serials, including The Shadow, and moved on to TV in the 1950’s; his credits in that medium include scripts for Navy Log, The Defenders, Tallahassee Seven Thousand, the pioneering British police series No Hiding Place, The Wild Wild West, and Star Trek.
Ehrlich’s early novels attempted to be more ambitious and controversial than his work for the constricted TV medium. In The Big Eye (1947), astronomers predict that an errant planet is about to hit the Earth in order to compel combative nations to unite against the common threat, although the encounter turns out to be a near miss. He reverted to more conventionally hard-boiled fare in such novels as Spin the Glass Web (1951), First Train to Babylon (1955) and The Takers (1961), but attempted a sharper political edge again in the technothriller Deep Is the Blue (1964), which featured a nuclear submarine.
Much of Ehrlich’s later fiction is movie-related. The Edict (1974) is a novelization of the screenplay of the 1972 movie Z. P. G. (which stands for “zero population growth”), which he wrote in collaboration with Frank de Felitta. The novel it is typical of alarmist fiction in that it trades on the popularity of anxieties about the population explosion. The exotic murder mystery The Reincarnation of Peter Proud (1974) was published as a novel before the screenplay was filmed; Reincarnation in Venice (1979) is a sequel.
His most interesting novel of this period was The Cult (1978), an alarmist thriller describing the methods and hidden agendas of a fundamentalist cult called Souls for Jesus. Naked Beach (1979) and The Big Boys (1979) are straightforward exercises in orthodox sensationalism, while Shaitan (1981) is a conventional horror novel. Ehrlich died in 1983.