He was flayed by the conservative Hollywood establishment for having left-wing sympathies, and blacklisted he turned his attention to music full-time. Koenig’s life in movies was effectively ended by the Red Scare in 1953, when he was called to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee. ![]() Returning to civilian life as Wyler’s second-in-command, Koenig played key roles on such landmark films as The Best Years of Our Lives (Dana Andrews, Fredric March, Myrna Loy), The Heiress (Olivia de Havilland, Montgomery Clift), Detective Story (Kirk Douglas, Eleanor Parker), Carrie (Laurence Olivier, Jennifer Jones) and Roman Holiday (Audrey Hepburn, Gregory Peck). ![]() Among Koenig’s wartime output with Wyler was the celebrated script for the documentary The Memphis Belle: A Story of a Flying Fortress (1944), a film that was praised by President Roosevelt after he screened it at the White House. Within a year, in 1943, he was working with director William Wyler, an association that would last nine years. entered World War II, Koenig joined the Army Air Corp’s film unit, writing scripts for war documentaries. A New Orleans-style jazz revival was emerging in the Bay Area and Koenig helped document the burgeoning movement by financing and producing records beginning in 1941 for the Jazz Man catalog, records by such figures as Lu Watters, Bob Scobey, Turk Murphy and others. Koenig befriended the owners of Jazz Man, Marili Morden and her successive husbands, David Stuart and Nesuhi Ertegun, both of whom remained friends and eventually worked together for Koenig at Contemporary. Jazz Man was just down the block from Paramount's main gate on Melrose Avenue and was a regular haunt for Koenig. He produced sessions (his first) for Jazz Man Records, a record store that also produced recordings. Koenig was a full-fledged Hollywood screenwriter, but he never abandoned his passion for jazz. Schulberg wired Koenig, instructing him to drop everything and come to Hollywood, where Schulberg would set him up as a writer at Paramount. After a time at Yale Law School, which he left after his father died, Koenig was hired by Martin Block to work at New York radio station, WNEW, on his popular program, Make Believe Ballroom, on which Block played records by dance bands, simulating the ambience of a ballroom to give the illusion that he was broadcasting live concerts. ![]() The elder Schulberg appreciated Koenig’s film and music reviews in the Dartmouth paper and got to know him during family vacations that Koenig spent in California with the Schulberg family. Schulberg, was the head of production at Paramount Pictures. ![]() In fact, Koenig might not have devoted himself to music as a career had he not, years later, been targeted by political persecution.Īt Dartmouth College, among Koenig’s friends was Budd Schulberg whose father, B.P. Record collecting led to a lifelong friendship with future music industry icon John Hammond, seven years his senior, who took the young Koenig along to recording sessions he, Hammond, was producing, sparking in Koenig the passion to own a jazz record company one day. An intellectual who loved the arts, Les Koenig (pronounced Kay-nig) fell in love with jazz as an adolescent in New York, where he grew up, the son of a judge. Founded in 1951 by Lester Koenig (Decem– November 21, 1977), Contemporary Records is a uniquely Hollywood story.
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