Stanley R. Greenberg on AllMovie

The father of the "theater of fact" docudrama genre and the writer of the well-loved sci-fi film Soylent Green, Stanley Greenberg captured the imaginations of his audience whether working in fact or fiction, often mixing the two into a potent concoction that encouraged audiences to ponder social issues and question the use of nuclear weapons. A Chicago native, Brown University graduate, and veteran of World War II, Greenberg initially broke into show-business after submitting a script for the popular television drama The Defenders in the early '60s. Later hired by the producers as a writer for the show, Greenberg continued to work in television until making his feature debut with the high-flying suspense film Skyjacked in 1972. Greenberg's penning of the Soylent Green script netted the writer a Nebula Award for Science Fiction Writing in 1973, and his subsequent scripts for Pueblo (1973) and the following year's The Missiles of October encouraged television viewers to consider the ill effects of war. After tracing the Watergate scandal of Richard Nixon special council member John Dean in the television miniseries Blind Ambition, Greenberg penned F.D.R.: The Last Year (1980) and the small-screen thriller Breaking Point in 1989. A staunch supporter of Israeal and anti-nuclear activist who was dedicated to numerous social causes, Greenberg died in his San Francisco Bay Area home as the result of a brain tumor in August 2002. He was 74.