Christopher Paul Lewis (August 1, 1944 – January 28, 2021) was an American writer and film producer, primarily for television.
Family
Christopher Lewis was the elder son of Hollywood actress
Loretta Young
Loretta Young (born Gretchen Michaela Young; January 6, 1913 – August 12, 2000) was an American actress. Starting as a child, she had a long and varied career in film from 1917 to 1989. She received numerous honors including an Academy Awards ...
and Hollywood producer Tom Lewis. Lewis had lived on the family's Beverly Hills estate until his teen years. Lewis was a middle child. His younger brother is Peter Lewis, one of the founding members of the seminal 1960s rock band
Moby Grape
Moby Grape is an American rock band founded in 1966. Part of San Francisco's psychedelic music scene, the band merged elements of rock and roll, folk music, pop, blues, and country. They were one of the few groups of which all members were lea ...
. Christopher and Peter Lewis were the half-brothers of actress
Judy Lewis
Judy Lewis (born Judith Young; November 6, 1935 – November 25, 2011) was an American actress, writer, producer, and therapist. She was the secret biological daughter of actors Loretta Young and Clark Gable.
Early life
Lewis was born on No ...
(1935–2011), daughter of Loretta Young and
Clark Gable
William Clark Gable (February 1, 1901November 16, 1960) was an American actor often referred to as the "King of Cinema of the United States, Hollywood". He appeared in more than 60 Film, motion pictures across a variety of Film genre, genres dur ...
. Their aunts were the actresses
Polly Ann Young
Polly Ann Young (October 25, 1908 – January 21, 1997) was an American actress.
Biography
Young was born in Denver, Colorado. Actresses Loretta Young and Sally Blane were her sisters. From 1917 to 1941, she was featured in over 40 movies ...
and
Sally Blane
Sally Blane (born Elizabeth Jane Young; July 11, 1910 – August 27, 1997) was an American actress who appeared in more than 100 movies.
Early life
Blane was born in Salida, Colorado, moving to California with her family in 1916.David Lindley was their cousin. Blane was the second wife of actor and director
Norman Foster
Norman Robert Foster, Baron Foster of Thames Bank (born 1 June 1935) is an English architect. Closely associated with the development of high-tech architecture, Lord Foster is recognised as a key figure in British modernist architecture. Hi ...
, who was an uncle of Lewis. Actress Georgiana Young was a half-sister of his mother, and she was married to actor
Ricardo Montalbán
Ricardo Gonzalo Pedro Montalbán y Merino, KSG ( ; ; November 25, 1920 – January 14, 2009) was a Mexican and American film and television actor. Montalbán's career spanned seven decades, during which he became widely known for performances ...
, making him a half-nephew of her and a half-nephew-in-law of him.
Film career
Christopher Lewis continued as a writer and producer of films primarily for television, through The Entertainment Group, a company co-owned with his wife, Linda G. Corkran. Christopher Lewis was also a producer of horror films, including '' Blood Cult'' (1985), one of the earliest direct-to-video releases and the first to turn a significant profit.
In later years, Christopher Lewis' actress mother entrusted her son with the rights to ''
The Loretta Young Show
''The Loretta Young Show'' (originally known as ''Letter to Loretta'') is an American anthology drama television series broadcast on Sunday nights from September 2, 1953, to June 4, 1961, on NBC for a total of 165 episodes. The series was hoste ...
''. He and his wife thereafter became co-producers of contemporary television broadcasts of the show, which have also been released on DVD.
Involvement in DOM-Lyric
In October 1973, Lewis was indicted on four counts of sex perversion and two counts of child molesting following a three-month investigation. Lewis, who at the time was a resident of Beverly Hills, had been identified as a film production manager for Billy Byars and Associates, which had also been responsible for the production of DOM-Lyric which was a child pornography front. It was found that boys between the ages of 6 and 17 years old had performed in the movies.
When Lewis was interviewed about his arrest, he mentioned that he had been spending Labor Day at his father's house when he received a phone call from a friend mentioning that individuals involved with Lyric had been arrested in regard to child pornography. Lewis was primarily concerned due to the money the Lyric enterprise had sunk into the television market in the Soviet Union.
Lewis claimed that there had been no sex between him and any underage boys involved with DOM-Lyric. He felt that he was targeted due to his relation to his mother, Loretta Young.
Lewis had gone on the record stating, "This was the kind of case the police liked, because it gave them a chance to shine in public—defending morality against perverts and pornography and child molesters and all those other loaded terms. Naturally it would behoove them to arrest me, with the built-in publicity value of my mother's name. So they would have gotten the arrest one way or another. Since they couldn't find the evidence ready-made, they simply manufactured it."
Death
Christopher Lewis died on January 28, 2021, of heart issues, while wintering in Florida with his wife.
Christopher
Christopher is the English language, English version of a Europe-wide name derived from the Greek language, Greek name Χριστόφορος (''Christophoros'' or ''Christoforos''). The constituent parts are Χριστός (''Christós''), "Jesus ...