Alan Herman (January 26, 1916 – June 29, 1995), known professionally as Ted Allan, was a Canadian screenwriter, author, and poet, several of whose books were made into motion pictures. In 1975, he received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Writing (Original Screenplay) and won a Golden Globe for Best Foreign Film for the film Lies My Father Told Me.

Ted Allan was born in Montreal as Alan Herman.

In 1934 he met and became friends with Norman Bethune. In February 1937 Allan joined Lincoln Battalion of the International Brigades to fight against fascism in Spanish Civil War. At the direction of the Brigade, Ted worked as a reporter — he broadcast to America from Madrid — and worked again with Bethune. In 1939 he published his first novel, This Time a Better Earth, drawing on his experiences in the War.

In 1952, Allan and Sydney Gordon published Bethune's biography, The Scalpel, The Sword. Allan battled for nearly 40 years to make a movie about the Canadian surgeon who became a larger-than-life hero of the Chinese revolution. The film, Bethune: The Making of a Hero, for which Allan wrote the screenplay, was the first official Chinese co-production, shooting in China, Montreal and Spain was released in 1990. It starred Donald Sutherland and Helen Mirren.

Allan co-wrote the script for John Cassavetes's celebrated movie Love Streams (released in 1984), which won the Golden Bear Award at Berlin International Film Festival. The film was based on one of Allan's plays, I've Seen You Cut Lemons, which was directed by Sean Connery at the Fortune Theatre in London in 1969.

Allan won the Stephen Leacock Award in 1985 for his novel Love Is a Long Shot.

He died of respiratory failure on June 29, 1995 at the age of 79. He is the subject of the 2002 National Film Board documentary Ted Allan: Minstrel Boy of the Twentieth Century.

Source: Article "Ted Allan" from Wikipedia in English, licensed under CC-BY-SA 3.0.

Ted Allan est un scénariste et acteur canadien né le 26 janvier 1916 à Montréal (Québec, Canada), décédé le 29 juin 1995 à Toronto (Ontario, Canada).

Le 25 juillet 1937, Ted Allan est envoyé spécial de la Federated Press et du journal Clarion de Toronto lors de la bataille de Brunete, lorsqu'un char républicain percute la voiture où il se trouve en compagnie de la photographe Gerda Taro, qui s'était juchée sur le marchepied. Elle décède le lendemain et lui aura le pied cassé.

Sa pièce la plus célèbre est Double Image, écrite en collaboration avec Roger MacDougall et créée en 1956 par Laurence Olivier et Richard Attenborough au Savoy Theatre de Londres. Elle connaîtra un immense succès en France sous le titre de Gog et Magog, adaptation de Gabriel Arout, mise en scène de François Périer, avec Jacqueline Maillan, François Périer, René Blancard et Teddy Bilis au Théâtre de la Michodière (plus de 1000 représentations).

Source: Article "Ted Allan" de Wikipédia en français, soumis à la licence CC-BY-SA 3.0.