Famed screenwriter Ernest Lehman has died.
“Don’t talk about our dead screenwriter, Mr. Blue Sky.”
Roger Thornhill: “Apparently the only performance that will satisfy you is when I play dead.”
Phillip Vandamm: “Your very next role, and you’ll be quite convincing, I assure you.”
RIP
From The Sweet Smell of Success: “You’re blind, Mr. Magoo. This is the crossroads for me. I won’t get Kello. Not for a lifetime pass to the Polo Grounds. Not if you serve me Cleopatra on a plate.”
Truth to tell, I don’t know if that line came from Lehman or from Clifford Odets, but it’s one of my favorite lines in all of film.
What a great writer! RIP
His book, Screening Sickness and Other Tales of Tinsel Town, is a very fine look at screenwriting and other Hollywood diseases.
A great writer. His work lives on.
“That’s fish four days old. I won’t buy it!” 
So does his family. Mr. Lehman was 89 and his youngest son was 3.