After getting his college degree in Oriental languages (St Petersburg Univ., 1907), Ilya Surguchev became a writer who attracted the attention of the famous Maxim Gorky (Gor'kii). Through his "Znanie Press", Gorky helped to get Surguchev's first stories and first novel ("The Governor," 1912) published. Surguchev's biggest success came when he was only 34, with his stage play "Autumn Violins" (performed at the Moscow Art Theater, 1915). Like several other successful creative people, Surguchev left Russia after the Communist Revolution, and lived the rest of his days (1920-1956) in Western Europe, where he continued to write and publish, although not with the same success as the romantic drama "Violins" back in the teens. That hit stage play was translated to English & published in New York (entitled simply "Autumn," 1924), although apparently not performed on Broadway or filmed at that time. Surguchev earned some money from the film industry (Fox Studio) in 1935, when he contributed to the script of "Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo" with Ronald Colman. This apparently attracted the attention of Fox Studio's famous Russian-born actor-director Gregory Ratoff (Grigorii Ratov or Baratov), who collaborated with British writer Margaret Kennedy to do another English adaptation of the Russian play "Autumn Violins" in the late 1930s. Ratoff's version, however, was laid aside due to WW2, and it was not until 1949 that Ratoff finally converted it to film, when he had left Fox Studio and was working abroad. This time Surguchev's romantic drama "Autumn Violins" was completely retitled as "That Dangerous Age," starring Myrna Loy and Roger Livesey. When Ratoff-Surguchev's film was later imported to the US, it was re-re-titled, as "If This Be Sin"! But so long as Surguchev was paid for his literary contribution, 34 years after he'd written it, perhaps he did not complain too much...

The Man Who Broke the Bank at Monte Carlo

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Ilya Surguchev

Writer