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- By Thomas Mackintosh
- bbc news
Image source, fake images
David Seidler won the Oscar for best original screenplay for The King’s Speech in 2011.
David Seidler, best known for writing the Oscar-winning film The King’s Speech, has died aged 86.
The London-born screenwriter, who stutters, brought to the big screen the true story of how King George VI overcame his speech impediment.
The 2010 film starred Colin Firth, who also won the Bafta and the Oscar for best actor for his portrayal of the king.
Seidler was also behind the stage adaptation of the film, which premiered in the West End in 2012.
He dedicated his 2011 Oscar to “all the stutterers in the world” and at the time thanked the Queen for “not putting me in the Tower for using the F-word.”
Seidler’s manager, Jeff Aghassi, confirmed to the BBC that he died on Saturday.
“David was in the place he loved most in the world, New Zealand, doing what gave him the most peace, which was fly fishing,” Aghassi said.
“If I had the chance, it’s exactly how I would have written it.”
Image source, fake images
David Seidler (fifth from left) stands alongside actors including Colin Firth (third from left) at the 68th Annual Golden Globe Awards at the Beverly Hilton Hotel in January 2011.
Throughout his career, Seidler wrote other projects, including the animated children’s musicals The King And I, Quest For Camelot, and Madeline: Lost in Paris.
Seidler won his first Writers Guild Award for the 1988 biopic Onassis: The Richest Man In The World, starring Raúl Julia as Greek shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis.
He also co-wrote Francis Ford Coppola’s 1988 comedy-drama Tucker: The Man And His Dream.
But the King’s Speech was what he was most familiar with. The plot follows the story of King George VI overcoming his severe stutter and his unexpected friendship with speech therapist Lionel Logue in the run-up to World War II.
In February 2011, Seidler received two Bafta awards and months later, in September, he received a Humanitas Award for his work.
Aghassi said the West End stage version of The King’s Speech was translated into “more than half a dozen languages”, including Italian, Japanese and Spanish.
It has been performed on four continents and its preparation to be on Broadway was only cut short in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
“David focused on the lessons of life, love, loss and rebirth,” Aghassi said.
“He continued to work on ideas that caught his interest and at the time of his death had multiple projects in active development, including documentaries, limited series and feature films.”
Additional information by Aruna Iyengar