Best Screenplays: 1930s

Note: The Academy's screenplay categories were different in the 1930s. For instance, there was only one writing category at the 1929/1930 ceremony. Also, the Adapted Screenplay winners credited below are actually from the Best Screenplay Oscar category, and the Original Screenplay winners are from the Best Original Story Oscar category.

Best Adapted Screenplay:

1930: All Quiet on the Western Front (Maxwell Anderson, George
Abbott, Del Andrews, and C. Gardner Sullivan)

Oscar winner: The Big House (Frances Marion) ('29/'30)

Was this nominated?: Yes

1931: M (Thea von Harbou and Fritz Lang)

Oscar winner: Cimarron (Howard Estabrook) ('30/'31)

Was this nominated?: No

1932: Love Me Tonight (Samuel Hoffenstein, George Marion Jr., and Waldemar Young)

Oscar winner: Bad Girl (Edwin Burke) ('31/'32)

Was this nominated?: No

1933: Design for Living (Ben Hecht)

Oscar winner: Little Women (Victor Heerman and Sarah Y. Mason) ('32/'33)

Was this nominated?: No

1934: It Happened One Night (Robert Riskin)

Oscar winner: It Happened One Night (Robert Riskin)

1935: The 39 Steps (Charles Bennett)

Oscar winner: The Informers (Dudley Nichols)

Was this nominated?: No

1936: Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (Robert Riskin)

Oscar winner: The Story of Louis Pasteur (Pierre Collings and Sheridan Gibney)

Was this nominated?: Yes

1937: The Awful Truth (Vina Delmar)

Oscar winner: The Life of Emile Zola (Heinz Herald, Geza Herczeg, and Norman Reilly Raine)

Was this nominated?: Yes

1938: The Lady Vanishes (Sidney Gilliat and Frank Launder)

Oscar winner: Pygmalion (George Bernard Shaw, Ian Dalrymple, Cecil
Lewis, and W.P. Lipscomb)

Was this nominated?: No

1939: Gone with the Wind (Sidney Howard)

Oscar winner: Gone with the Wind (Sidney Howard)

Best Original Screenplay:

1930: Under the Roofs of Paris (René Clair)

Oscar winner: The Big House (Frances Marion) ('29/'30)

Was this nominated?: No

1931: City Lights (Charlie Chaplin)

Oscar winner: The Dawn Patrol (John Monk Saunders) ('30/'31)

Was this nominated?: No

1932: One Way Passage (Robert Lord)

Oscar winner: The Champ (Frances Marion) ('31/'32)

Was this nominated?: Yes (won the next year)

1933: Duck Soup (Bert Kalmar and Harry Ruby)

Oscar winner: One Way Passage (Robert Lord) ('32/'33)

Was this nominated?: No

1934: L'Atalante (Jean Guinée, Albert Riéra, and Jean Vigo)

Oscar winner: Manhattan Melodrama (Arthur Caesar)
Was this nominated?: No

1935: The Man Who Knew Too Much (Charles Bennett, D.B. Wyndham Lewis, Edwin Greenwood, A.R. Rawlinson, and Emlyn Williams)

Oscar winner: The Scoundrel (Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur)

Was this nominated?: No

1936: Modern Times (Charlie Chaplin)

Oscar winner: The Story of Louis Pasteur (Pierre Collings and Sheridan Gibney)

Was this nominated?: No

1937: A Star is Born (William A. Wellman, Robert Carson, Dorothy Parker, and Alan Campbell)

Oscar winner: A Star is Born (William A. Wellman and Robert Carson)

1938: Grand Illusion (Charles Spaak and Jean Renoir)

Oscar winner: Boys Town (Eleanore Griffin and Dore Schary)

Was this nominated?: No

1939: The Rules of the Game (Jean Renoir and Carl Koch)

Oscar winner: Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (Lewis R. Foster)

Was this nominated?: No

Updated: 9/12/15