Samson Raphaelson

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Samson Raphaelson (March 30, 1894 in New York City – July 16, 1983 in New York City) was an American screenwriter and playwright.

Born in New York City, Raphaelson worked on nine films with Ernst Lubitsch, including Trouble in Paradise (1932), The Shop Around the Corner (1939), Heaven Can Wait (1943), and That Lady in Ermine (1948). He also collaborated with Alfred Hitchcock on Hitchcock's Suspicion (1941). He is the author of the play Day of Atonement, which was made into The Jazz Singer (1927), the first talking picture, produced by Warner Brothers in the Vitaphone sound-on-disc process. Samson Raphaelson was also Ernst Lubitsch's favorite screenwriter.

Samson Raphaelson considered Suspicion to be "in many ways my best screenplay." Raphaelson also co-wrote Lubitsch's only sound-era drama Broken Lullaby (The Man I Killed, 1932). Though praised by playwright Robert E. Sherwood as "the best talking picture that has yet been seen and heard," the film was a box office flop. Aside from his more popular work, Raphaelson also wrote the college fight song for the University of Illinois in 1921. Titled, "Fight, Illini!: The Stadium Song" the music was composed by Rose J. Oltusky.