American Writer and Producer. Blees, who produced for television and film, wrote the screenplays for Douglas Sirk’s 1954 classic ‘Magnificent Obsession’, which starred Rock Hudson and Jane Wyman, and 1956’s ‘Autumn Leaves’, with Joan Crawford and Cliff Robertson. Blees attended Dartmouth College and worked for Time and Life magazines before turning to screenwriting and producing. He came to Hollywood in 1940, landing a job as a scenarist for Warner Bros. During World War II, he served as a bomber navigator in the U.S. Army Air Corps. Over the course of a show business career lasting more than four decades, he amassed a considerable number of credits in television, among them ‘Damon Runyon Theater’, ‘Alfred Hitchcock Presents’, ‘Peter Gunn’, ‘Zane Grey Theater’, ‘Kraft Suspense Theater’ and ‘Gidget’s Summer Reunion’.  He produced several TV series including ‘Combat’, Bonanza’ and ‘Cannon’. Among films he worked on were ‘The Glass Web’ (1953), ‘Cattle Queen of Montana’ (1954), ‘The Black Scorpion’ (1956), ‘High School Confidential’ (1958), ‘From the Earth to the Moon’ (1958), ‘Whoever Slew Auntie Roo?’ (1972), ‘Frogs’ (1972), ‘Dr. Phibes Rises Again’ (1972) and ‘Savage Harvest’ (1981). Blees also served for decades on the board of the Motion Picture & Television Fund and was a former board member of Writers Guild of America and the Producers Guild of America. (bio by: Louis M.)