Robert Benchley- American Humorist

 

Robert Charles Benchley (September 15, 1889 – November 21, 1945) was an American humorist best known for his work as a newspaper columnist and film actor. From his beginnings at The Harvard Lampoon while attending Harvard University, through his many years writing essays and articles for Vanity Fair and The New Yorker and his acclaimed short films, Benchley's style of humor brought him respect and success during his life, from his peers at the Algonquin Round Table in New York City to contemporaries in the burgeoning film industry.

Benchley is best remembered for his contributions to The New Yorker, where his essays, whether topical or absurdist, influenced many modern humorists. He also made a name for himself in Hollywood, when his short film How to Sleep was a popular success and won Best Short Subject at the 1935 Academy Awards. He also made many memorable appearances acting in films such as Alfred Hitchcock's Foreign Correspondent (1940) and Nice Girl? (1941). Also, Benchley appeared as himself in Walt Disney's behind the scenes film, The Reluctant Dragon (1941). His legacy includes written work and numerous short film appearances. 

Robert Benchley was born on September 15, 1889, in Worcester, Massachusetts, the second son of Maria Jane (Moran) and Charles Henry Benchley. They were of Northern Irish (Protestant) and Welsh descent, respectively, both from colonial stock. His brother Edmund was thirteen years older. Benchley was later known for writing elaborately misleading and fictional autobiographical statements about himself (at one point asserting that he wrote A Tale of Two Cities before being buried at Westminster Abbey).

His father served in the Union army for two years during the Civil War and had a four-year hitch in the Navy before settling again in Worcester, marrying and working as a town clerk. Benchley's grandfather Henry Wetherby Benchley, a member of the Massachusetts Senate and Lieutenant Governor in the mid-1850s, went to Houston, Texas and became an activist for the Underground Railroad for which he was arrested and jailed.

Robert's older brother Edmund (born March 3, 1876)^[6] was a 4th year cadet at West Point in 1898 when his class was graduated early to support preparations for the Spanish–American War; he was killed July 1 at the Battle of San Juan Hill. When news reached the family, Maria's stunned reaction was to cry out, "Why couldn't it have been Robert?!"; accounts conflict as to whether Robert (who was nine at the time) heard this.

Edmund's fiancée Lillian Duryea, a wealthy heiress, doted on Robert for many years, and Edmund's death may have seeded the pacifist leanings seen in Robert's writing.^[8] Additionally, because the news about Edmund had arrived during a July 4th celebration, Robert for the rest of his life associated fireworks with Edmund's death.

Robert grew up and attended South High School in Worcester and was involved in academic and traveling theatrical productions during high school. Thanks to financial aid from his late brother's fiancée, Lillian Duryea, he could attend Phillips Exeter Academy in Exeter, New Hampshire for his final year of high school. Benchley reveled in the atmosphere at the academy, and he remained active in creative extracurricular activities, thereby damaging his academic credentials toward the end of his term.

Benchley enrolled at Harvard University in 1908, again with Duryea's financial help.^[17] He joined the Delta Upsilon fraternity in his first year, and continued to partake in the camaraderie that he had enjoyed at Phillips Exeter while still doing well in school. He did especially well in his English and government classes. His humor and style began to reveal themselves during this time: Benchley was often called upon to entertain his fraternity brothers, and his impressions of classmates and professors became very popular. His performances gave him some local fame, and most entertainment programs on campus and many off-campus meetings recruited Benchley's talents.

During his first two years at Harvard, Benchley worked with the Harvard Advocate and the Harvard Lampoon. He was elected to the Lampoon's board of directors in his third year. The election of Benchley was unusual, as he was the publication's art editor and the board positions typically fell to the foremost writers on the staff. The Lampoon position opened a number of other doors for Benchley, and he was quickly nominated to the Signet Society meeting club as well as becoming the only undergraduate member of the Boston Papyrus Club at the time.

Along with his duties at the Lampoon, Benchley acted in a number of theatrical productions, including Hasty Pudding productions of The Crystal Gazer and Below Zero. He also held the position of κροκόδιλος for the Pudding in 1912. Benchley kept these achievements in mind as he began to contemplate a career for himself after college. Charles Townsend Copeland, an English professor, recommended that Benchley go into writing, and Benchley and future Benchley illustrator Gluyas Williams from the Lampoon considered going into freelance work writing and illustrating theatrical reviews. Another English professor recommended that Benchley speak with the Curtis Publishing Company; but Benchley was initially against the idea, and ultimately took a position at a civil service office in Philadelphia. Owing to an academic failure in his senior year due to an illness, Benchley would not receive his Bachelor of Arts from Harvard until the completion of his credits in 1913. His shortcoming was the submission of a "scholarly paper" – which Benchley eventually rectified by a treatise on the U.S. – Canadian Fisheries Dispute, written from the point of view of a cod. He took a position with Curtis shortly after he received his diploma.

Benchley began at Vanity Fair with fellow Harvard Lampoon and Hasty Pudding Theatricals alumnus Robert Emmet Sherwood and future friend and collaborator Dorothy Parker, who had taken over theatre criticism from P. G. Wodehouse years earlier. The format of Vanity Fair fit Benchley's style very well, allowing his columns to have a humorous tone, often as straight parodies. Benchley's work was typically published twice a month. Some of Benchley's columns, featuring a character he created, were attributed to his pseudonym Brighton Perry, but he took credit for most of them himself. Sherwood, Parker, and Benchley became close, often having long lunches at the Algonquin Hotel. When the editorial managers went on a European trip, the three took advantage of the situation, writing articles mocking the local theatre establishment and offering parodic commentary on a variety of topics, such as the effect of Canadian ice hockey on United States fashion. This worried Sherwood, as he felt it could jeopardize his forthcoming raise.

The situation at Vanity Fair deteriorated upon management's return. They sent out a memo forbidding the discussion of salaries in an attempt to rein in the staff. Benchley, Parker, and Sherwood responded with a memo of their own, followed by placards around their necks detailing their exact salaries for all to see. Management attempted to issue "tardy slips" for staff who were late. On one of these, Benchley wrote out, in very small handwriting, an elaborate excuse involving a herd of elephants on 44th Street. These issues contributed to a general deterioration of morale in the offices, culminating in Parker's termination, allegedly due to complaints by the producers of the plays she skewered in her theatrical reviews. Upon learning of her termination, Benchley tendered his own resignation. Word of it was published in Time by Alexander Woollcott, who was at a lunch with Benchley, Parker, and others. Given that Benchley had two children at the time of his resignation, Parker referred to it as "the greatest act of friendship I'd ever seen."

Following word of Benchley's resignation, freelance offers began piling up. He worked constantly while claiming he was intensely lazy. (According to legend, he submitted a magazine piece titled "I Like to Loaf" two weeks after deadline. His explanatory note: "I was loafing."^[43]) He was offered $200 per basic subject article for The Home Sector,^[44] and a weekly freelance salary from New York World to write a book review column three times per week for the same salary he received at Vanity Fair. The column, titled "Books and Other Things," ran for one year and roved beyond literature to mundane topics such as Bricklaying in Modern Practice. Unfortunately for Benchley, however, his writing a syndicated column for David Lawrence drew the ire of his World bosses, and "Books and Other Things" was dropped.

Benchley continued to freelance, submitting humor columns to a variety of publications, including Life (where fellow humorist James Thurber stated that Benchley's columns were the only reason the magazine was read). He continued meeting with his friends at the Algonquin, and the group became popularly known as the Algonquin Round Table.^[49] In April 1920, Benchley landed a position with Life writing theatre reviews, which he would continue doing regularly through 1929, eventually taking complete control of the drama section.^[47] His reviews were known for their flair, and he often used them as a soapbox for issues of concern to him, whether petty (people who cough during plays) or more important (such as racial intolerance).

Things changed again for Benchley a number of years into the arrangement. A theatrical production by the members of the Round Table was put together in response to a challenge from actor J. M. Kerrigan, who was tired of the Table's complaints about the ongoing theatre season. The result, which played for one night April 30, 1922 at the 49th Street Theatre, was No Sirree! (the name being a pun of the European revue La Chauve-Souris), "An Anonymous Entertainment by the Vicious Circle of the Hotel Algonquin." Benchley's contribution to the program, "The Treasurer's Report," featured Benchley as a nervous, disorganized man attempting to summarize an organization's yearly expenses. The revue was applauded by both spectators and fellow actors, with Benchley's performance receiving the biggest laughs. A reprise of "The Treasurer's Report" was often requested for future events, and Irving Berlin (who had been musical director for No Sirree!) prompted producer Sam H. Harris to request Benchley to perform it as part of Berlin's Music Box Revue. Reluctant to appear onstage as a regular performer, Benchley decided to ask Harris for the outlandish sum of $500 a week for his short act in order to get out of the situation entirely; when Harris replied "OK, Bob. But for $500 you better be good," Benchley was completely surprised. The Music Box Revue opened in September 1921 and ran until September 1922, with Benchley appearing in his eleven-minute turn eight times a week (evening performances on Monday through Saturday and matinees on Wednesday and Saturday).  Wikipedia