Aaron Edward Hotchner (June 28, 1917[note 1] – February 15, 2020) was an American editor, novelist, playwright, and biographer.[7] He wrote many television screenplays as well as noted biographies of
Doris Day and
Ernest Hemingway. He co-founded the charity food company
Newman's Own with actor
Paul Newman.[8]
After the United States entered
World War II following the
Attack on Pearl Harbor, he served from 1942 to 1945 in the
U.S. Army Air Corps as a journalist, attaining the rank of major. When the war was over, he decided to forgo his law practice to pursue a career in writing.[citation needed]
Literary career
Hotchner was an editor, biographer, novelist and playwright.[1] In 1948, he met
Ernest Hemingway, and the two were close friends until Hemingway died in 1961. Hotchner wrote his biography of Hemingway, Papa Hemingway, in 1966. He wrote teleplays in the 1950s and 1960s adapting Hemingway's The Snows of Kilimanjaro, The Killers, The Fifth Column, and After the Storm. Hotchner's biography of Doris Day, Doris Day: Her Own Story, was published in 1975.
The film King of the Hill (1993), directed by
Steven Soderbergh, is a screen adaptation of Hotchner's 1973 autobiographical novel of the same name.[13] A
Depression-era,
bildungsroman memoir, it tells the story of a boy struggling to survive on his own in a hotel in St. Louis, after his mother is committed to a
sanatorium with
tuberculosis and his younger brother is sent to live with an uncle. His father, a German immigrant and
traveling salesman working for the
Hamilton Watch Company, is off on long trips from which the boy cannot be certain he will return.[citation needed]
Hotchner's play The White House starred
Helen Hayes in a Broadway production staged at
Henry Miller's Theater in 1964. Hayes played multiple
First Ladies from United States history.[14] It was performed at the
White House itself in 1996. In 1993, Welcome to the Club, a musical comedy written with composer
Cy Coleman, appeared on Broadway. In addition, Hotchner wrote A Short Happy Life, The Hemingway Hero, Exactly Like You (written with Coleman), and The World of Nick Adams.[citation needed]
Hotchner's play Sweet Prince was produced off-Broadway in 1982, at the Theater Off-Park, starring
Keir Dullea and
Ian Abercrombie.[15]
Personal life and philanthropy
With actor
Paul Newman, a friend and neighbor, Hotchner founded
Newman's Own, Inc in 1982. All profits from this line of food products and other ventures are donated to charities.[12] In 1988, Hotchner and Newman co-founded the
Hole in the Wall Gang Camp, a residential summer camp and year-round center for seriously ill children located in
Ashford, Connecticut. The original camp was later expanded to become a number of other Hole in the Wall Camps at other locations in the U.S., Ireland, France, and beyond. By 2016, there were 30 camps and programs serving the needs of over 130,000 children and families around the world, as part of the
SeriousFun Children's Network.[citation needed]
Hotchner resided with his wife Virginia Kiser in
Westport, Connecticut, where he spent most weekends, and cared for a
grey parrot.[4] He was known for his collection of birds, and, outside his home in Westport, he had five peacocks.[citation needed] He loved to teach the kids on his road about the different birds and would sit and look at them often. He died on February 15, 2020, at the age of 102.[17]
Partial bibliography
The Boyhood Memoirs of A. E. Hotchner: King of the Hill and Looking for Miracles (Missouri History Museum Press, 2007,
ISBN978-1-883982-60-7)
The Day I Fired Alan Ladd and Other World War II Adventures (U. of Missouri Press, 2002,
ISBN978-0-8262-1432-4)
Shameless Exploitation in Pursuit of the Common Good: the Madcap Business Adventure of the Truly Oddest Couple Paul Newman and A.E. Hotchner, (Random House, 2003,
ISBN978-0-385-51159-9).
^EMERITUS, ROBERT A. COHN, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF.
"Paul Newman: Mega-star and Mensch". St. Louis Jewish Light. Archived from
the original on March 23, 2021. Retrieved February 24, 2021.{{
cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (
link)