Biography
Ted Tally (born William Theodore Tally) is an American playwright and screenwriter. Born on 9 April 1952 in North Carolina, he was educated at Yale College and the Yale School of Drama, where he has also taught.
Tally is best known for adapting Thomas Harris's novel into the screenplay for The Silence of the Lambs (1991), for which he received the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay, the Writers Guild of America Award, the Chicago Film Critics Award and the Edgar Award. His other screenplays include White Palace (1990), The Juror (1996), Before and After (1996), All the Pretty Horses (2000), Red Dragon (2002) and 12 Strong (2018). He has also worked as a script consultant on Shrek 2 (2004).
As a playwright, Tally's works include Terra Nova, which won an Obie Award, and Coming Attractions, which received the Outer Critics Circle Award. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation.
