Norman Panama

For thirty years (1936-66), this American screenwriter, director and producer of popular comedy fare worked mostly successfully in collaboration with college chum Melvin Frank, forming an unusual partnership in which they not only shared writing and producing duties, but also co-directed features. Panama and Frank met while undergraduates at the University of Chicago, where they formed a writing team. Migrating to Hollywood in 1938, they wrote comedy material for Bob Hope's radio broadcasts, eventually, working for Phil Baker and Rudy Vallee as well. In 1942, the duo was hired by Paramount and they contributed the story to the farcical Hope vehicle "My Favorite Blonde," in which the comic was the trainer of penguins unwittingly used to transport data for a female spy. Based on this success, Panama and Frank went on to script several lightweight but affable movies, including "Happy Go Lucky" (1943), wherein Rudy Vallee is chased by Mary Martin, and the Eddie Cantor musical "Thank You Lucky Stars" (also 1943). The failure of the all-star "Duffy's Tavern" (1945), which attempted to transfer a radio show to the big screen, might have signaled the end of their career had they not sent Hope, Bing Crosby and Dorothy Lamour to the Klondike in "The Road to Utopia" (also 1945) which earned the writing team its first Oscar nomination.