Bob Weiskopf

Bob Weiskopf (March 13, 1914 – February 20, 2001) was an American screenwriter and producer for television. He has credits for I Love Lucy which he and his writing partner Bob Schiller joined in the fifth season. They also wrote for The Lucy-Desi Comedy Hour, The Lucy Show, Maude, All in the Family (for which he won a 1978 Emmy for co-writing the episode "Cousin Liz"), Archie Bunker's Place, The Red Skelton Show, the short-lived Pete and Gladys, and Sanford (the spin-off of Sanford and Son). Life and career Weiskopf, born in Chicago, Illinois, began writing for television in 1950, when he wrote an episode for The Colgate Comedy Hour. Weiskopf first tried comedy writing at the suggestion of friends Norman Panama and Melvin Frank. Panama and Frank lured him to Hollywood in 1940, where he managed to sell some jokes to Bob Hope for his radio program. From there, he later wrote for radio, for Eddie Cantor's The Eddie Cantor Show, and Rudy Vallée for his Rudy Vallee's Sealtest Program, he would in later years, write comedy material for Fred Allen, Danny Thomas, Red Skelton, Phyllis Diller and Carol Burnett. After the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, he sent his new bride, the former Eileen Ito, east to avoid the internment camps, and moved in with fellow Rudy Vallee writer Jess Oppenheimer (who 13 years later would hire his former roommate to write for I Love Lucy). Weiskopf and his wife Eileen were reunited a few months later when he moved to New York City, where he was hired to write radio comedy for the comedian-actor Fred Allen. When Weiskopf received a draft notice ordering him to report on June 1, 1942, he requested a two-week delay so that he could finish writing the last two Fred Allen shows of the season. The Draft Board summarily rejected his request, explaining, "Everybody knows Fred Allen writes his own material."