[citation needed] He was 22 and still at the University of Iowa when his anti-lynching play, The Tree, became a 1932 Broadway production under the direction of the young Robert Rossen, later known for Body and Soul (1947) and a life destroyed by the Hollywood blacklist.
In 1933, the year in which Hitler ascended to his dictatorial powers in Germany, Maibaum wrote the first openly anti-Nazi play on Broadway, Birthright, also directed by Rossen.
Maibaum then wrote Sweet Mystery of Life (1935) a stage comedy which eventually became the film Gold Diggers of 1937 (1936).
His rapid rise as a playwright soon earned him a contract as a writer for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, then the most powerful and prestigious studio in Hollywood.
While moving to LA and under contract to MGM, he wrote another play, See My Lawyer which was produced in New York by George Abbott and which starred Milton Berle.
Maibaum joined the U.S. Army in 1942 and, like many other Hollywood writers and directors, was commissioned as a captain in the Signal Corps, During his four and one-half years in the army, he produced war morale films, assembled and disseminated combat film footage (presumably while stationed overseas) and supervised a documentary history of World War II, whose title, length, whereabouts, and, indeed, purpose, are currently unknown.
(1946), which starred Alan Ladd in a fictional story of the newly formed Office of Strategic Services, the precursor to the CIA.
John Farrow, original director of the project, quit after a casting dispute with Maibaum and was replaced by Elliott Nugent.
He also began writing for the new medium of television, including short teleplays for The Kate Smith Evening Hour, and the critically acclaimed Emmy nominated "Fearful Decision" starring Ralph Bellamy and Sam Levene which he also co-wrote with Cyril Hume for The United States Steel Hour.
Maibaum returned to The University of Iowa in 1954 for one semester to teach and supervise the "Footsteps of Freedom" project, a teleplay writing course.
He wrote some episodes of Wagon Train (1958) and provided the story for Warwick's The Bandit of Zhobe (1959) and Killers of Kilimanjaro (1959).
Maibaum wrote and produced a war film for 20th Century Fox starring Audie Murphy, Battle at Bloody Beach (1961).
Maibaum was brought on to write the first Bond movie, Dr. No (1962), sharing credit with Johanna Harwood and Berkely Mather.
Maibaum received sole script credit for On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969), starring George Lazenby.
He did an early draft of Diamonds Are Forever (1971), then the producers wanted an American writer and hired Tom Mankiewicz to rework it.
Maibaum was brought back to the Bond movies to work on Mankiewicz's draft of The Man with the Golden Gun (1974).
"[10] Maibaum is credited with adding the essential ingredient of humor to the James Bond films, an element lacking in the original Fleming novels.