Lewis John Carlino, Oscar-Nominated Screenwriter, Dies at 88 (Published 2020)

Lewis John Carlino, a screenwriter and playwright who earned an Oscar nomination for “I Never Promised You a Rose Garden” and who both adapted and directed “The Great Santini,” died on June 17 at his home on Whidbey Island, Wash. He was 88.

His daughter, Alessa Carlino, said the cause was complications of myelodysplastic syndrome, a blood disease.

Mr. Carlino had written several Off Broadway plays earlier, including “Cages,” “Telemachus Clay,” and “Doubletalk.” His other screenwriting credits included John Frankenheimer’s “Seconds” (1966); “The Sailor Who Fell From Grace With the Sea” (1976), starring Kris Kristofferson and Sarah Miles, which he also directed; “The Brotherhood” (1968), starring Kirk Douglas; “The Mechanic” (1972), starring Charles Bronson; and “Resurrection” (1980).

In a long career of writing and directing for the stage, the screen and television, however, Mr. Carlino was best known for the films “I Never Promised You a Rose Garden” (1977), based on Joanne Greenberg’s novel about a teenage girl’s struggle with schizophrenia, for which he and Gavin Lambert received an Oscar nomination for best adapted screenplay; and “The Great Santini” (1979), based on the autobiographical novel by Pat Conroy, which he adapted and directed. That movie’s stars, Robert Duvall and Michael O’Keefe, were nominated for Academy Awards, and Mr. O’Keefe was nominated for a Golden Globe.

After Mr. Carlino read Mr. Conroy’s novel about a son’s troubled relationship with his authoritarian and abusive father, a Marine Corps fighter pilot, he later recalled, he wrote furiously, finishing the entire screenplay in 21 days.

“I loved its humanity. I loved its humor,” Mr. Carlino told The New York Times in 1980. “The people were very real. They just leaped off the page for me.”