E.T. writer goes home after bout with cancer

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This article was published 06/11/2015 (3972 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

LOS ANGELES — Melissa Mathison never wrote down to her audiences.

Known for her family friendly films such as the unequaled E.T. the Extra Terrestrial and the elegant The Black Stallion, Mathison’s stories were rich with symbolism, adventure, depth and darkness.

With intricate plots and grown-up themes of loneliness and loss, her films enchanted a generation of kids and their parents.

Mathison died Wednesday at 65 after a bout with neuroendocrine cancer, her sister, Melinda Mathison Johnson, said.

Mathison was just in her early 30s when she found success with E.T. The film’s cultural significance continues to resonate three decades later. Steven Spielberg may have come up with the idea, but Mathison made it into a story.

As far as Hollywood currency goes, she crafted one for the ages.

“Melissa had a heart that shined with generosity and love and burned as bright as the heart she gave E.T.,” Spielberg said in a statement.

Mathison, a Los Angeles native, had a humble but high-profile start. Her first credited work was in assistant roles on The Godfather: Part II and Apocalypse Now, before she broke out with her script for The Black Stallion. Carol Ballard directed the warmly received adaptation released in 1979.

It was on the set of Apocalypse Now in 1976 that Mathison met Harrison Ford, who she married in 1983 and divorced in 2004 after multiple separations. She and Ford had two children, Georgia and Malcolm.

Mathison worked with directors such as Frank Oz on The Indian in the Cupboard and Martin Scorsese on 1997’s Kundun, a biographical film about the Dalai Lama.

But history will most fondly remember her for fleshing out the story of the friendly, homesick alien E.T. The film, directed by Spielberg and released in 1982, became one of the highest grossing of all time.

Hollywood lore has it that Spielberg and Ford, then her boyfriend, convinced Mathison to write the screenplay on a 330-kilometre drive through the Tunisian desert during the shoot for Raiders of the Lost Ark.

The script for E.T. earned Mathison her first and only Oscar nomination. She lost to John Briley’s Gandhi screenplay.

— The Associated Press