Leonard Gershe was an American

United States

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

 playwright

Playwright

A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...

, screenwriter

Screenwriter

Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...

, and lyricist

Lyricist

A lyricist is a songwriter who specializes in lyrics. A singer who writes the lyrics to songs is a singer-lyricist. This differentiates from a singer-composer, who composes the song's melody.-Collaboration:...

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Born in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

, Gershe made his Broadway

Broadway theatre

Broadway theatre, commonly called simply Broadway, refers to theatrical performances presented in one of the 40 professional theatres with 500 or more seats located in the Theatre District centered along Broadway, and in Lincoln Center, in Manhattan in New York City...

 debut as a lyricist for the 1950 revue

Revue

A revue is a type of multi-act popular theatrical entertainment that combines music, dance and sketches. The revue has its roots in 19th century American popular entertainment and melodrama but grew into a substantial cultural presence of its own during its golden years from 1916 to 1932...

 Alive and Kicking

Alive and Kicking (musical)

Alive and Kicking is a musical revue with sketches by Ray Golden, I.A.L. Diamond, Henry Morgan, Jerome Chodorov, Joseph Stein, Will Glickman, John Murray, and Michael Stuart; music by Hal Borne, Irma Jurist, Sammy Fain, Hoagy Carmichael, Harold Rome, Sonny Burke, Leo Schumer, and Ray Golden; and...

. He wrote the book for Harold Rome's musical

Musical theatre

Musical theatre is a form of theatre combining songs, spoken dialogue, acting, and dance. The emotional content of the piece – humor, pathos, love, anger – as well as the story itself, is communicated through the words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an...

 stage adaptation of Destry Rides Again

Destry Rides Again (musical)

Destry Rides Again is a 1959 musical comedy with music and lyrics by Harold Rome and a book by Leonard Gershe. The play is based on the 1939 classic film of the same name.- Production history :...

in 1959, and in 1969 a play, Butterflies are Free

Butterflies Are Free (play)

Butterflies Are Free is a play by Leonard Gershe.Loosely based on the life of attorney Harold Krents, the plot revolves around a Manhattan blind man whose controlling mother disapproves of his relationship with a free-spirited hippie. The title was inspired by a passage in Charles Dickens' Bleak...

. Later Gershe wrote another play, Snacks, intended for Tony Danza

Tony Danza

Tony Danza is an American actor best known for starring on the TV series Taxi and Who's the Boss?, for which he was nominated for an Emmy Award and four Golden Globe Awards...

.

He wrote the lyrics for the "Born in a Trunk" sequence from the Judy Garland

Judy Garland

Judy Garland was an American actress and singer. Through a career that spanned 45 of her 47 years and for her renowned contralto voice, she attained international stardom as an actress in musical and dramatic roles, as a recording artist and on the concert stage...

/James Mason

James Mason

James Neville Mason was an English actor who attained stardom in both British and American films. Mason remained a powerful figure in the industry throughout his career and was nominated for three Academy Awards as well as three Golden Globes .- Early life :Mason was born in Huddersfield, in the...

 musical A Star Is Born

A Star Is Born (1954 film)

A Star Is Born is a 1954 American musical film directed by George Cukor. The screenplay written by Moss Hart was an adaptation of the original 1937 film, which was based on the original screenplay by Robert Carson, Dorothy Parker, and Alan Campbell...

. In the 1950s, Gershe wrote ten scripts for the Ann Sothern

Ann Sothern

Ann Sothern was an American film and television actress whose career spanned six decades.-Early life and career:...

 sitcom

Situation comedy

A situation comedy, often shortened to sitcom, is a genre of comedy that features characters sharing the same common environment, such as a home or workplace, accompanied with jokes as part of the dialogue...

 Private Secretary

Private Secretary (TV series)

Private Secretary is an American sitcom that aired from February 1, 1953 to September 10, 1957 on CBS, alternating with The Jack Benny Program on Sundays at 7:30pm EST...

. He also wrote a number of episodes of The Lucy Show. His screen credits include Funny Face

Funny Face

Funny Face is an American musical film released in 1957 in VistaVision Technicolor, with assorted songs by George and Ira Gershwin. The film was written by Leonard Gershe and directed by Stanley Donen. It stars Audrey Hepburn, Fred Astaire, and Kay Thompson...

, 40 Carats

Forty Carats

Forty Carats is a play by Jay Allen.Adapted from the French original by Pierre Barillet and Jean-Pierre Gredy, the comedy revolves around a 40-year-old American divorcee who is assisted by a 22-year-old when her car breaks down during a vacation in Greece...

, and Butterflies Are Free.

Gershe died in Beverly Hills, California from complications from a stroke

Stroke

A stroke, previously known medically as a cerebrovascular accident , is the rapidly developing loss of brain function due to disturbance in the blood supply to the brain. This can be due to ischemia caused by blockage , or a hemorrhage...

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Nominations

• 1958 Academy Award for Best Writing, Story and Screenplay, Written Directly for the Screen (Funny Face)
• 1958 Writers Guild of America
  Writers Guild of America
  The Writers Guild of America is a generic term referring to the joint efforts of two different US labor unions:* The Writers Guild of America, East , representing TV and film writers East of the Mississippi....
  
  Award for Best American Musical (Funny Face)
• 1973 Writers Guild of America Award for Best Comedy Adapted from Another Medium (Butterflies Are Free)
• 1974 Writers Guild of America Award for Best Comedy Adapted from Another Medium (40 Carats)