S. J. Perelman
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S.J. Perelman, photograph courtesy of James A. Michener Art Museum archives, Doylestown, Pennsylvania | | |
FICTION WRITER, STAGE & SCREEN ARTIST
BORN: February 1, 1904, Brooklyn, New York
DIED: October 17, 1979, New York, New York
[Perelman was] one of the few remaining writers in America who devoted themselves wholly to humor.-William Shawn, The New York Times, October 18, 1979
Touted as "the funniest man alive," S.J. Perelman was a remarkably accomplished and versatile humorist. Through wordplay, puns, and scathing parody, he achieved his celebrated effect of "spoofery" and "zaniness." Initially a cartoonist, Perelman wrote brief humor pieces for highbrow magazines, including, most notably, the New Yorker. He particularly delighted in parodic travel narratives, the most famous of which was Swiss Family Perelman. To supplement his income he wrote screenplays, sometimes in collaboration with his wife, Laura. His most famous scripts were the Marx Brothers' Monkey Business and Horse Feathers, as well as Around the World in Eighty Days, for which he earned an Academy Award in 1956. Raised in Providence, Rhode Island, Perelman attended Brown University, where he met Nathanael West, whose sister, Laura, he married. The Perelmans divided their time between New York City and Erwinna, in Bucks County. After becoming widowed in 1970, Perelman lived for three years in London before returning permanently to the United States.
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