16/07/2021
The Hilarious BRUCE VILANCH is STEVE BLUESTEIN'S guest on LET ME SAY THIS ABOUT THAT - Friday, July 16 LIVE at 4 PM PDT - replays available at your convenience!
Show link: https://youtube.com/watch?v=lFaQDmAn7a8
Bruce Vilanch is an American comedy writer, songwriter, actor, and six-time Emmy Award-winner. He is best known to the public for his four-year stint on Hollywood Squares, as a celebrity participant; behind the scenes he was head writer for the show. In 2000, he performed off-Broadway in his self-penned one-man show, Bruce Vilanch: Almost Famous.
From 2000 to 2014, Vilanch was the head writer for the Oscars, after being an Oscar program co-writer for the previous ten years.[3] He is a featured writer for the Tonys, Grammys, and Emmys
Vilanch's career in the entertainment industry began with writing features for the Chicago Tribune. As an entertainment writer, he began spending time with as many celebrities as would let him. It was how he met then-struggling singer Bette Midler. Becoming friends, Vilanch later wrote comedy material for Midler's 1974 Broadway show Clams on the Half Shell and co-wrote Divine Madness for her in 1980.
Following a move to Los Angeles, Vilanch was a co-writer for The Donny & Marie Show, and the short-lived Brady Bunch Variety Hour. After cancellation of the Brady Bunch show, he went on to write jokes for Lily Tomlin, Billy Crystal, Roseanne Barr, Rosie O'Donnell, Paul Reiser, Dame Elizabeth Taylor, Steven Tyler of Aerosmith, and Robin Williams.
Vilanch wrote for the Academy Awards from 1989 to 2014, providing topical joke material for the show's hosts. In the 1990s, Vilanch collaborated with hosts Whoopi Goldberg, David Letterman, and Billy Crystal. He became head writer in 2000, serving until 2014.
In a 2010 Vanity Fair interview, Vilanch was asked for whom he wrote the Oscars show jokes, replying: "I write across the board. Every year it breaks down differently, depending on the host, but as we get closer to the date, all of the writers tend to be writing over each other. Everyone's contributing to everybody else's work. There are four of us writing the actual show, and you end up writing and rewriting so many things at the same time. So, I do a little of everything. There's a lot of mileage involved in writing for the Academy Awards, you go through a lot of hoops." When asked if he could see himself doing the job for another 21 years, he replied: "Absolutely. It's the greatest show on Earth. It's like asking somebody, 'Hey, would you like to play in the Super Bowl next year?' Did anybody get into football not to play in the Super Bowl? Does anybody get into show business not to do the biggest show in the world?"
