Edward Knoblock (1874-1945), Playwright

Sitter in 6 portraits
His first play, The Shulamite, was staged in 1906, but the one play for which he is now remembered is Kismet, an immediate success in London on opening in 1911. It has been made into several film versions as well as a musical stage adaptation. Born of German parents in New York, he became a naturalised British citizen in 1914 and served in the British Intelligence Service during World War I. After the war, he divided his time between London and Hollywood, writing for the film company of Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford. He wrote some thirty or forty plays and many screenplays, the best-known being The Three Musketeers (1921) and Robin Hood (1922).