William Peter Blatty

William Peter Blatty January 7 1928 January 12 2017 was an American writer director and producer He is best known for his 1971 novel The Exorcist and for his screenplay for the 1973 film adaptation Blatty won an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay for The Exorcist and was nominated for Best Picture as its producer The film also earned Blatty a Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture Drama as producer Born and raised in New York City Blatty received his bachelors degree in English from Georgetown University in 1950 and his masters degree in English literature from the George Washington University Following completion of his masters degree in 1954 he joined the United States Air Force and served in the Psychological Warfare Division where he attained the rank of first lieutenant After service in the air force he worked for the United States Information Agency in Beirut After the success of The Exorcist Blatty reworked his 1966 novel Twinkle Twinkle Killer Kane into a new novel titled The Ninth Configuration published in 1978 He went on to adapt the novel into the 1980 film which was also his directorial debut At the 38th Golden Globe Awards the film won Best Screenplay and was nominated for Best Picture Blatty refused to have any involvement with the first sequel to The Exorcist it was critically panned He directed the second sequel The Exorcist III 1990 which he adapted from his 1983 novel Legion His second film as a director The Exorcist III was his final directorial credit and final screenplay credit Some of his later novels include Elsewhere 2009 Dimiter 2010 and Crazy 2010 Description above from the Wikipedia article William Peter Blatty licensed under CCBYSA full list of contributors on Wikipedia