Max Shulman (1919-1988) began writing Dobie Gillis stories in 1945 for
various humor magazines. In 1951, these were collected and published as a
book
entitled "The
Many Loves of Dobie Gillis".
In 1959, Shulman published another volume of Dobie stories, "I Was
A Teenage Dwarf". That same year, Shulman created and produced "The
Many Loves of Dobie Gillis" TV series for CBS. The show had a run of 147
episodes between 1959 and 1963. Shulman wrote most of the teleplays for the
first two seasons, (but, sadly, only a few during the third and fourth.) Many
of the first season episodes were direct translations of his original short
stories and they
brought to the TV show a refreshing literacy with a slightly subversive flavor,
unexpected for a network comedy of the Eisenhower era.
Before his two Dobie books, Shulman had already written four other successful novels: "Barefoot Boy With Cheek", "The Feather Merchants", "The Zebra Derby" and "Sleep Till Noon". After the Dobie books he wrote "Rally Round The Flag Boys", which became a best-seller and then a movie starring Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward, Joan Collins, Dwayne Hickman and Tuesday Weld! (Sadly, this wonderful movie is not available on video!)
Besides producing the Dobie TV series, Shulman's credits include
co-writing the Broadway play "The Tender Trap" which later became a
film starring Frank Sinatra, and the 1970 film "House Calls" starring
Walter Matthau.
Max was also the world's most underrated romantic poet! He loved to include poetry in his novels, usually to hilarious effect. For some examples of Shulman's poetic genius, click here!
Max Shulman's last novels were "Anyone Got A Match?", a biting satire about cigarette advertising on television ("Tatums Smoke Mild Like an Innocent Child!") and then finally his semi-autobiographical "Potatoes Are Cheaper".
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