Carl Gottlieb

In his five-and-a-half-hour interview, Carl Gottlieb talks about his early years, and joining The Committee improv group in San Francisco. He discusses working with various members of that group, including Peter Bonerz, Del Close, and Avery Schreiber, and later collaborating with Howard Hesseman and Rob Reiner. He recounts writing for The Summer Brothers Smothers Show, which lead to a writing job on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour. Gottlieb recalls the tumultuous years on that show, including fights between CBS and the Smothers, which eventually led to the cancellation of the show. He speaks of working on several Flip Wilson Specials, which included Wilson, Peter Sellers, Richard Pryor, and Lily Tomlin. He describes a short stint writing for The Odd Couple, which he left to write the screenplay for Steven Spielberg’s classic Jaws. He recounts also working on the features The Jerk and Caveman, which starred Ringo Starr. He concludes with a discussion of the craft of writing, and his career highlights and regrets. Dan Pasternack conducted the interview in a joint venture with the Writers Guild Foundation on October 24, 2018 in North Hollywood, CA.