Herbert J. Biberman was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 screenwriter

Screenwriter

Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...

 and film director

Film director

A film director is a person who directs the actors and film crew in filmmaking. They control a film's artistic and dramatic nathan roach, while guiding the technical crew and actors.-Responsibilities:...

. He may be best known for having been one of the Hollywood Ten as well as directing Salt of the Earth

Salt of the Earth

Salt of the Earth is an American drama film written by Michael Wilson, directed by Herbert J. Biberman, and produced by Paul Jarrico. All had been blacklisted by the Hollywood establishment due to their alleged involvement in communist politics....

, a 1954 film about a zinc miners' strike in Grant County, New Mexico

Grant County, New Mexico

-2010:Whereas according to the 2010 U.S. Census Bureau:*84.9% White*0.9% Black*1.4% Native American*0.4% Asian*0.1% Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander*2.8% Two or more races*9.8% Other races*48.3% Hispanic or Latino -2000:...

.

He was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Philadelphia is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Philadelphia County, with which it is coterminous. The city is located in the Northeastern United States along the Delaware and Schuylkill rivers. It is the fifth-most-populous city in the United States,...

, to Joseph and Eva Biberman. Biberman's pre-blacklist career included writing such films as King of Chinatown, When Tomorrow Comes, Action in Arabia, The Master Race, and New Orleans, as well as directing such films as One Way Ticket, Meet Nero Wolfe, and The Master Race. He married actress Gale Sondergaard

Gale Sondergaard

Gale Sondergaard was an American actress.Sondergaard began her acting career in theatre, and progressed to films in 1936. She was the first recipient of the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her film debut in Anthony Adverse...

 in 1930; the marriage endured until Biberman's death. Herbert Biberman died from bone cancer

Cancer

Cancer , known medically as a malignant neoplasm, is a large group of different diseases, all involving unregulated cell growth. In cancer, cells divide and grow uncontrollably, forming malignant tumors, and invade nearby parts of the body. The cancer may also spread to more distant parts of the...

 in 1971 in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

.

Brother of American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 artist

Artist

An artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only...

, Edward Biberman

Edward Biberman

Edward Biberman was an American artist active in the mid-twentieth century. His work ranged from stylised portraits to history-inspired murals, and drew on the emerging urban landscapes of southern California, and on current events such as the Great Depression, the Second World War, and labour...

.

The Blacklist

In 1947, the U.S. House Committee on Un-American Activities began investigating the film industry, and Biberman became one of ten Hollywood writers and directors cited for contempt of Congress

Contempt of Congress

Contempt of Congress is the act of obstructing the work of the United States Congress or one of its committees. Historically the bribery of a senator or representative was considered contempt of Congress...

 when they refused to answer questions about their Communist Party USA

Communist Party USA

The Communist Party USA is a Marxist political party in the United States, established in 1919. It has a long, complex history that is closely related to the histories of similar communist parties worldwide and the U.S. labor movement....

 affiliation.

Biberman and his fellow Ten went to jail over their contempt convictions, Biberman for six months. Edward Dmytryk ultimately cooperated with the House committee, but Biberman and the others were blacklisted by official Hollywood

Cinema of the United States

The cinema of the United States, also known as Hollywood, has had a profound effect on cinema across the world since the early 20th century. Its history is sometimes separated into four main periods: the silent film era, classical Hollywood cinema, New Hollywood, and the contemporary period...

 movie studio

Movie studio

A movie studio is a term used to describe a major entertainment company or production company that has its own privately owned studio facility or facilities that are used to film movies...

 bosses.

Biberman went to work independently after his release from jail. The result was Salt of the Earth

Salt of the Earth

Salt of the Earth is an American drama film written by Michael Wilson, directed by Herbert J. Biberman, and produced by Paul Jarrico. All had been blacklisted by the Hollywood establishment due to their alleged involvement in communist politics....

, a fictionalized account of the Grant County miners' strike written by Michael Wilson

Michael Wilson (writer)

Michael Wilson was an Academy Award winning American screenwriter who was blacklisted by the Hollywood movie studio bosses during the era of McCarthyism....

 and produced by Paul Jarrico

Paul Jarrico

Paul Jarrico was an American screenwriter and film producer who was blacklisted by the Hollywood movie studio bosses during the era of McCarthyism.-Early years:...

, neither of whom were members of the Ten but both of whom were also blacklisted. Biberman died in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

.

Salt of the Earth has been deemed "culturally significant" by the United States Library of Congress

Library of Congress

The Library of Congress is the research library of the United States Congress, de facto national library of the United States, and the oldest federal cultural institution in the United States. Located in three buildings in Washington, D.C., it is the largest library in the world by shelf space and...

 and selected for preservation in the National Film Registry

National Film Registry

The National Film Registry is the United States National Film Preservation Board's selection of films for preservation in the Library of Congress. The Board, established by the National Film Preservation Act of 1988, was reauthorized by acts of Congress in 1992, 1996, 2005, and again in October 2008...

. The film has also been preserved by the Museum of Modern Art

Museum of Modern Art

The Museum of Modern Art is an art museum in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It has been important in developing and collecting modernist art, and is often identified as the most influential museum of modern art in the world...

 in New York. Wilson, one of the blacklisted screenwriters who worked under assumed names, later won an Academy Award for a screenplay he wrote under a nom de plume, Bridge on the River Kwai.

One of the Hollywood Ten

One of the Hollywood Ten

One of the Hollywood Ten is a Spanish and British bio-picture. The film was written and directed by Karl Francis.The drama focuses on screenwriter/director Herbert Biberman and his efforts to make, what would become the historic political film, Salt of the Earth , produced without studio backing...

, a 2000 film chronicling his blacklisting and the making of Salt of the Earth from Biberman's point of view, starred Jeff Goldblum

Jeff Goldblum

Jeffrey Lynn "Jeff" Goldblum is an American actor. His career began in the mid-1970s and he has appeared in major box-office successes including The Fly, Jurassic Park and its sequel Jurassic Park: The Lost World, and Independence Day...

 as Biberman and Greta Scacchi

Greta Scacchi

Greta Scacchi is an Italian-Australian actor.-Early life:Scacchi was born Greta Gracco in Milan, Italy, on 18 February 1960, the daughter of Luca Scacchi Gracco, an Italian art dealer and painter, and Pamela Carsaniga, an English dancer and antiques dealer...

 as Gale Sondergaard. The film's closing credits

Closing credits

Closing credits or end credits are added at the end of a motion picture, television program, or video game to list the cast and crew involved in the production. They usually appear as a list of names in small type, which either flip very quickly from page to page, or move smoothly across the...

 noted Biberman had never been removed from the old blacklist formally, and that Sondergaard had not found work in Hollywood until after her husband's death. Standing by her man had cost Sondergaard almost a quarter century of hard painful eduring work.

Filmography

Year	Film	Role	Notes
1935 1935 in film -Events:*Judy Garland signs a contract with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer .*Seven year old Shirley Temple wins a special Academy Award.*The Bantu Educational Kinema Experiment started in order to educate the Bantu peoples.-Top grossing films:-Academy Awards:...	Eight Bells	dialogue director
	One-Way Ticket	Director	(as Herbert Biberman)
1936 1936 in film The year 1936 in film involved some significant events.-Events:*May 29 - Fritz Lang's first Hollywood film Fury, starring Spencer Tracy and Bruce Cabot, is released.*November 6 - first Porky Pig animated cartoon...	Meet Nero Wolfe Meet Nero Wolfe Meet Nero Wolfe is a 1936 mystery film based on the 1934 novel Fer-de-Lance, written by Rex Stout. Set in New York, the story introduced the detective genius Nero Wolfe and his assistant Archie Goodwin...	Director
1939 1939 in film The year 1939 in motion pictures can be justified as being called the most outstanding one ever, when it comes to the high quality and high attendance at the large set of the best films that premiered in the year .- Events :Motion picture historians and film often rate...	King of Chinatown	Writer Screenwriter Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...  (story)
	When Tomorrow Comes When Tomorrow Comes (film) When Tomorrow Comes is a 1939 romantic drama film starring Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer. A waitress falls in love with a man who later turns out to be a married concert pianist. Bernard B...	Writer Screenwriter Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...	(uncredited)
1944 1944 in film The year 1944 in film involved some significant events, including the wholesome, award-winning Going My Way plus popular murder mysteries such as Double Indemnity, Gaslight and Laura.-Events:*July 20 - Since You Went Away is released....	Action in Arabia	Writer Screenwriter Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...  (original screenplay)	(as Herbert Biberman)
	The Master Race	Writer Screenwriter Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...  (screenplay) (story), Director
	Together Again Together Again (film) Together Again is a 1944 comedy film directed by Charles Vidor. The screenplay was written by F. Hugh Herbert and Virginia Van Upp, based on story by Herbert J...	Writer Screenwriter Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...  (story)	(as Herbert Biberman)
1946 1946 in film The year 1946 in film involved some significant events.-Events:*November 21 - William Wyler's The Best Years of Our Lives premieres in New York featuring an ensemble cast including Fredric March, Myrna Loy, Dana Andrews, Teresa Wright, and Harold Russell.*December 20 - Frank Capra's It's a...	Abilene Town Abilene Town Abilene Town was a 1946 western film directed by Edwin L. Marin. The film starred Randolph Scott, Ann Dvorak, Lloyd Bridges, Rhonda Fleming, and Edgar Buchanan....	associate producer
1947 1947 in film The year 1947 in film involved some significant events.-Events:*May 22 - Great Expectations is premiered in New York.*November 24 : The United States House of Representatives of the 80th Congress voted 346 to 17 to approve citations for contempt of Congress against the "Hollywood Ten".*November 25...	New Orleans	Writer Screenwriter Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...  (story), associate producer
1950 1950 in film The year 1950 in film involved some significant events.-Events:* February 15 - Walt Disney Studios' animated film Cinderella debuts.-Top grossing films : After theatrical re-issue- Awards :Academy Awards:*Ambush...	The Hollywood Ten The Hollywood Ten The Hollywood Ten is an American 16mm short documentary film. In the film, each member of the Hollywood Ten made a short speech denouncing McCarthyism and the Hollywood Blacklisting.The film was directed by John Berry...	Himself	(uncredited)
1954 1954 in film The year 1954 in film involved some significant events and memorable ones.-Events:*May 12 - The Marx Brothers' Zeppo Marx divorces wife Marion Benda...	Salt of the Earth Salt of the Earth Salt of the Earth is an American drama film written by Michael Wilson, directed by Herbert J. Biberman, and produced by Paul Jarrico. All had been blacklisted by the Hollywood establishment due to their alleged involvement in communist politics....	Director
1969 1969 in film The year 1969 in film involved some significant events.-Events:* Last year for prize giving at the Venice Film Festival until it is revived in 1980...	Slaves Slaves (film) Slaves is a 1969 drama film directed by Herbert Biberman. It was entered into the 1969 Cannes Film Festival. The film stars Dionne Warwick , Ossie Davis, and Stephen Boyd.-Plot:...	Writer Screenwriter Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:... , Director

External links

.

• Review in TV Guide of biopic, "One of the Hollywood Ten."