Actor. One of "The Hollywood 10" - ten actors, writers and directors who appeared before the House UnAmerican Activities Committee in 1947 and refused to divulge whether or not they were, or had ever been, members of the Communist Party and if they knew others in the entertainment industry who were. The purpose of the hearings was to examine the possible infiltration of Communists into the industry. The fervor that the hearings created so shook up Hollywood that whoever did not comply with the Committee was blacklisted from working in Hollywood. The ten - Ornitz, John Howard Lawson, Alvah Bessie, Dalton Trumbo, Lester Cole, Albert Maltz, Herbert Biberman, Adrian Scott, Ring Lardner, Jr. and Edward Dmytryk - were sent to various federal prisons in 1950 for contempt of Congress. Ornitz was released 9 months into his sentence for good behavior and was among many people to initiate a series of lawsuits to overturn the blacklisting policy, but was unsuccessful. He wrote the novel "Haunch, Paunch and Jowl" in 1926, which dealt with various aspects of life in New York's Lower East Side, circa 1910. He had a brief career as a social worker before moving to Hollywood in 1928, where he wrote movie scripts until 1944. His last recorded work, before the blacklist, was an adaptation of the film "Circumstantial Evidence" for Twentieth Century Fox in 1944. His screenwriting credits include, among others, "Men of America," "Secrets of the French Police," "Hell's Highway," "One Man's Journey," "The Richest Man in the World," "Three Kids and a Queen," "Mark of the Vampire," and "Follow Your Heart," among many others. Ornitz, along with Lester Cole and John Howard Lawson, founded the Screen Actors Guild. He published the book "Bride of the Sabbath" in 1951, which dealt with first and second generation American Jews and was well received by critics. He died of Bronchopneumonia in the Motion Picture Country Home in Woodland Hills, California.