On the Waterfront

Schulberg's Academy Award–winning screenplay about ex-boxer and dock worker Terry Malloy, whose talent made him a contender and whose courage will make him a hero

The film On the Waterfront garnered eight Oscars; the leading role of Terry Malloy was perhaps Marlon Brando's tour de force. But none of these achievements would have been possible without the explosive, inspired script written by Budd Schulberg. The story of stevedores sweating and dying for a corrupt, Mob-run union, and one former boxer's quixotic fight for dignity, stands among the most iconic narratives of American cinema. Deeply influenced by Schulberg's own reporting on New York and New Jersey crime families, unions, and the boxing world, as well as on earlier reporting by Malcolm Johnson, this screenplay represents a singular confluence of American artistry and political history.