​'Star Wars' and 'Indiana Jones' Screenwriter Gloria Katz Dies at 76

BY Sarah MurphyPublished Nov 29, 2018

Hollywood screenwriter Gloria Katz, best known for work on films like Star Wars and Indiana Jones, has passed away. She died on Sunday (November 25), following a battle with ovarian cancer.
 
Katz is survived by her husband Willard Huyck, who was also her scriptwriting partner.
 
The pair were married in 1969, and began working with George Lucas (who Huyck had befriended in college) shortly thereafter. They wrote American Graffiti with Lucas, earning them an Oscar nomination.
 
Lucas later asked Katz and Huyck to edit his screenplay for Star Wars. In a 2017 interview with The Mary Sue, Katz said they added lots of humour into film and wrote approximately 30 percent of the dialogue. She also took credit for morphing Carrie Fisher's Princess Leia into a strong female lead that didn't "take any shit."
 
Katz and Huyck went on to pen scripts for other films like the Huyck-directed French Postcards, Best Defence and Howard the Duck, eventually reuniting with Lucas on projects like Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom and Radioland Murders.

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