Laughing Matters:: On Writing M*A*S*H, Tootsie, Oh, God!, and a Few Other Funny Things

Anyone who has ever seen "Tootsie" or several episodes of "M.A.S.H." or the Broadway musical comedy "A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum" (one of the very few musicals that is actually also a COMEDY!) knows how very funny Gelbart is.With this volume of articles, memories, and even bits of scripts, Gelbart helps us understand why he has won awards in every medium he's written for, why he is so respected and, obviously, loved by people who work with him. This is a delightful, much-too-brief book, worthwhile if only for its appreciation of performers from Jack Benny to Whoopie Goldberg.One of the other on-line reviewers has called this book the "worst kind of popular pulp fiction trash." And it very well might be, were it not for the fact that it is TRUTH, NOT FICTION.

This book is a grabbag of stray pieces and brief recollections (interrupted by odd notes from the editor, who seems to have forced these contributions from Gelbart). Almost all are entertaining in themselves but they don't add up to the comprehensive overview that such a varied and stellar career deserves. The best sections are written with a Hollywood-weary knowingness that is smart and funny (can we just call that "Gelbartian"?) The worst are his star-struck adulation of the comics of his youth, which brings out the previously unseen hack in this great writer. Regularly fun, but not what it should be.