LARRY GELBART

Larry Gelbart was born in Chicago in 1928, but his parents moved to Los Angeles when he was young. His amazing talent as a comedy writer showed very early, and he got a job as a writer for Danny Thomas' radio show when he was just 16! He worked for many of the top radio comics in the 1940s, and when they switched to TV in the early 1950s, he switched with them. In 1953, he joined the staff of "Your Show of Shows", Sid Caesar's show which had the most remarkable writing staff ever assembled, including Gelbart, Mel Brooks, and Neil Simon! In 1962, he co-wrote the Broadway musical farce A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, with Burt Shevelove and Stephen Sondheim, and it was made into a movie in 1966. In 1972, he was one of the creators of the TV series based on the hit movie M*A*S*H, and he wrote, produced or directed many of the episodes in the first four seasons. In 1977, he wrote the screenplay for Oh, God! and the following year he wrote the wonderful parody of 1930s movies, "Movie Movie". In 1982, he wrote the screenplay for Tootsie. In 1992, he wrote the Broadway play, City of Angels, a marvelous send-up of film noir AND behind the scenes Hollywood. The following year he wrote the screenplay for TV's Barbarians at the Gate. These are just a few of the many highlights of this extraordinary man's career! In between all of the above, Gelbart authored numerous other movies, TV scripts, and plays, and it is hard to believe a single man could have written so much wonderful material! He passed away in 2009 at the age of 81.