IMDB Entry
Al Boasberg was one of the greats of radio comedy, but you have to be a completist to know anything about him. He was a gag writer and made a living -- often a very lucrative one -- selling gags to vaudeville and radio comedians, and acting as what today we'd call a script doctor to punch up a movie.
Boasberg was born in Buffalo and grew up to work in his father's jewelry store. In in spare time, he wrote jokes and sent them to vaudeville comedians. In 1921, he sold his first jokes to vaudevillian Phil Baker for $5 each.* His career took off when George Burns came to town and offered him a job writing for him.
Word of his talent got around. He was instrumental in creating Jack Benny's comic persona and wrote for Bob Hope; Burns and Allen; Wheeler and Woolsey; and Leon Errol. He moved to Hollywood in 1926 to work with Buster Keaton and was credited as a writer on The General. He also wrote for Harold Lloyd, Olson and Johnson, and many others, usually uncredited. He was making $1000 a week to come in and add jokes to script and continued to write for Benny's radio show.
His most famous work was when he was hired to write a bit for the Marx Brothers in A Night at the Opera. Supposedly he had some falling out with the producers and did not deliver the script. When they went to find out where it was, they discovered it had been cut into strips with a single line that were nailed to the ceiling of his office. It was worth putting them together -- they were the basis for the classic stateroom scene.
He also contributed dialog to the classic horror film Freaks, certainly the odd movie out on his list of credits.
He also directed the occasional short subject.
Sadly, he died of a heart attack at age 45. Just the day before, he had introduced the character of Rochester to the Benny show.
A giant of comedy.
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*That may not sound like a lot, but it's the equivalent of about $80 today. It was a common practice even up to the 70s for comedians and cartoonists to buy jokes.
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