Bernard "Bernie" Sahlins is an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 writer, director and comedian best known as a founder of The Second City

The Second City

The Second City is a improvisational comedy enterprise which originated in Chicago's Old Town neighborhood.The Second City Theatre opened on December 16, 1959 and has since expanded its presence to several other cities, including Toronto and Los Angeles...

 improvisational comedy troupe with Paul Sills

Paul Sills

Paul Sills was a director and improvisation teacher, and the original director of Chicago's The Second City.-Biography:...

 and Howard Alk

Howard Alk

-Career:Alk enrolled in the University of Chicago at the age of 14. He was a member of the Compass Players cabaret troupe and one of the founders of The Second City. Alk had previously worked with Sills at the Gate of Horn. According to Sahlins, Alk coined the group's name...

 in 1959. Sahlins also opened the Second City Theatre in Toronto in 1973.

Sahlins graduated from University of Chicago

University of Chicago

The University of Chicago is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois, USA. It was founded by the American Baptist Education Society with a donation from oil magnate and philanthropist John D. Rockefeller and incorporated in 1890...

 in 1943. His brother is anthropologist Marshall Sahlins

Marshall Sahlins

Marshall David Sahlins is a prominent American anthropologist. He received both a Bachelors and Masters degree at the University of Michigan where he studied with Leslie White, and earned his Ph.D. at Columbia University in 1954 where his main intellectual influences included Karl Polanyi and...

.

When Sahlins received an honorary doctorate from Columbia College Chicago

Columbia College Chicago

Columbia College Chicago is one of the largest art colleges in the United States with nearly 12,000 students pursuing degrees within 120 undergraduate and graduate programs...

 in 2006, theatre department professor Sheldon Patinkin

Sheldon Patinkin

Sheldon Patinkin is the chair of the Theater Department of Columbia College Chicago, Artistic Director of the Getz Theater of Columbia College, Artistic Consultant of The Second City and of Steppenwolf Theatre and Co-Director of the Steppenwolf Theatre Summer Ensemble Workshops...

 wrote:

In 1953, he became a producer of Playwrights Theatre Club, the first professional theater company in Chicago in many years. It featured such budding actors and directors as Ed Asner

Ed Asner

Edward Asner , commonly known as Ed Asner, is an American film, television, stage, and voice actor and former president of the Screen Actors Guild, primarily known for his Emmy Award-winning role as Lou Grant on both The Mary Tyler Moore Show and its spin-off series, Lou Grant...

, Mike Nichols

Mike Nichols

Mike Nichols is a German-born American television, stage and film director, writer, producer and comedian. He began his career in the 1950s as one half of the comedy duo Nichols and May, along with Elaine May. In 1968 he won the Academy Award for Best Director for the film The Graduate...

, Elaine May

Elaine May

Elaine May is an American film director, screenwriter and actress. She achieved her greatest fame in the 1950s from her improvisational comedy routines in partnership with Mike Nichols...

, Paul Sills

Paul Sills

Paul Sills was a director and improvisation teacher, and the original director of Chicago's The Second City.-Biography:...

, Byrne

Byrne Piven

Byrne Piven was an influential American stage actor, director, and co-founder of the Playwrights Theatre Club, a forerunner of The Second City.-Life and career:...

 and Joyce Piven

Joyce Piven

Joyce Hiller Piven is a director, teacher and actress. She and her late husband, Byrne Piven, were actors in the Compass Players. Later they founded the Piven Theatre Workshop in Evanston, Illinois and became a teacher to a generation of stars such as John Cusack, Joan Cusack, Aidan Quinn, Adam...

, and me. In 1956, he took over the empty downtown Studebaker Theatre and did a year of plays which included the Chicago premiere of Waiting for Godot

Waiting for Godot

Waiting for Godot is an absurdist play by Samuel Beckett, in which two characters, Vladimir and Estragon, wait endlessly and in vain for someone named Godot to arrive. Godot's absence, as well as numerous other aspects of the play, have led to many different interpretations since the play's...

and then in 1959, with Paul Sills and Howard Alk, he opened The Second City where Bernie remained as producer and, eventually, one of the directors until the 1990s. Among the many talents he hired are John

John Belushi

John Adam Belushi was an American comedian, actor, and musician, best known as one of the original cast members of the NBC sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live, The Star of the Films National Lampoon's Animal House and the The Blues Brothers and for fronting the American blues and soul...

 and James Belushi

James Belushi

James Adam "Jim" Belushi is an American actor, comedian, and musician. He is the younger brother of comic actor John Belushi.-Early life:Belushi was born in Chicago...

, John Candy

John Candy

John Franklin Candy was a Canadian actor and comedian. He rose to fame as a member of the Toronto branch of The Second City and its related Second City Television series, and through his appearances in comedy films such as Stripes, Splash, Cool Runnings, The Great Outdoors, Spaceballs, and Uncle...

, Dan Aykroyd

Dan Aykroyd

Daniel Edward "Dan" Aykroyd, CM is a Canadian comedian, actor, screenwriter, musician, winemaker and ufologist. He was an original cast member of Saturday Night Live, an originator of The Blues Brothers and Ghostbusters and has had a long career as a film actor and screenwriter.-Early...

, Gilda Radner

Gilda Radner

Gilda Susan Radner was an American comedian and actress, best known as one of the original cast members of the NBC sketch comedy show Saturday Night Live, for which she won an Emmy Award in 1978.-Early life:...

, Harold Ramis

Harold Ramis

Harold Allen Ramis is an American actor, director, and writer, specializing in comedy. His best-known film acting roles are as Egon Spengler in Ghostbusters and Russell Ziskey in Stripes , both of which he also co-wrote...

 and Bill Murray

Bill Murray

William James "Bill" Murray is an American actor and comedian. He first gained national exposure on Saturday Night Live in which he earned an Emmy Award and later went on to star in a number of critically and commercially successful comedic films, including Caddyshack , Ghostbusters , and...

. Bernie was also one of the developers and producers of the acclaimed TV show SCTV

Second City Television

Second City Television is a Canadian television sketch comedy show offshoot from Toronto's The Second City troupe that ran between 1976 and 1984.- Premise :...

.

In 1986, Sahlins co-founded both The University of Chicago's Off-Off Campus

Off-Off Campus

Off-Off Campus is an improvisational and sketch comedy group at the University of Chicago, and the second-oldest collegiate group of its kind in the United States. It was founded in 1986 by The Second City co-founder Bernie Sahlins, who is also an alumnus of the U of C.Off-Off Campus stems from a...

and The International Theatre Festival of Chicago. Sahlins is the recipient of The Sergel prize for playwriting, The University of Chicago Professional Achievement Award, The Chicago Drama League’s Professional Achievement Award, Joseph Jefferson Awards for directing and professional achievement, The Illinois Arts Alliance "Legend" award, and the Improv Festival Achievement Award.

External links