Jay Sommers Scripts Collection

Title: Jay Sommers Scripts Collection

Dates: 1942-1971

Collection Number: WGF-MS-142

Creator/Collector: Sommers, Jay

Extent: 17.5 linear feet, 14 boxes

Repository: Writers Guild Foundation Archive

Abstract: The collection contains approximately 900 radio scripts and teleplays that Sommers wrote over his four-decade career as a writer and producer in Hollywood.

Language of Material: English

Open for research.

The responsibility to secure copyright permission rests with the patron.

[Identification of item]. Jay Sommers Scripts Collection. Collection Number: WGF-MS-142. Writers Guild Foundation Archive

Donated by Barbara Sommers on March 30, 2023

Jay Sommers was born in 1917 in New York to Alice and Joseph Jay Solomon. He worked as a comedy writer and producer in radio and television for four decades. His first hire was as a gag writer for Milton Berle in 1940. He wrote for radio shows at the Blue Network station WJZ in New York, and worked on shows including Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street. Sommers settled in Los Angeles during the late 1940s. Radio performers he wrote for include Milton Berle, Danny Kaye, Spike Jones, Alan Young, Joan Davis, Eddie Albert, Eddie Cantor, Red Skelton, the Victor Borge-Benny Goodman Show, the Jimmy Durante-Garry Moore Show and Lum and Abner. His work on television began with episodes of the Colgate Comedy Hour (for Spike Jones), the Peter Lind Hayes Show (1950), and the short-lived Buster Keaton Show aka Life with Buster Keaton (1951-1952). Sommers wrote for the Ozzie and Harriet radio program from 1952-1954 and the TV series for seasons 2 through 9, 1953-1960. Other TV shows he worked on include My Friend Irma, The Great Gildersleeve, The Amos ‘n’ Andy Show, Dennis the Menace, Grindl, Alice, and Hello Larry. He and writer Don Nelson came up with the original title, idea, and characters for the sitcom Bachelor Father (1957). Sommers was a writer and producer for the CBS series Petticoat Junction during its second and third seasons, 1964-1966. In 1965, prompted by Petticoat creator Paul Henning, Sommers created a spin-off series Green Acres, set in the same fictional universe. The idea derived from a short-lived 1950 radio series created by Sommers called Granby’s Green Acres, in which an urban couple moves to a rural farm. Sommers and co-writer Dick Chevillat wrote almost every one of the 170 episodes spanning 6 seasons of the show. Sommers’ film credits include the Pat Boone comedy All Hands on Deck (1961) and the story, with Dick Chevillat, for Gordy (1994). Jay Sommers died in Los Angeles in 1985 was survived by a wife Barbara, a son Jonathan and four stepsons.

The collection consists of scripts written or co-written by Jay Sommers throughout his career, organized by format. Some titles include episodes by other writers. There are approximately 300 radio episode scripts. The series are Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet, 1952-1954; Alan Young Show, 1944-1945; Chamber Music Society of Lower Basin Street, 1942-1944; Danny Kaye Show, 1945; Durante Moore Show, 1943-1944; Eddie Albert Show, 1947; The Eddie Cantor Show, 1947-1948; Joan Davis Show, 1945-1946; Lum and Abner, 1949-1950; Spike Jones Show, 1949; Victor Borge Show, 1946-1957. There are approximately 600 television scripts. The series are Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet, 1953-1960; Amos ‘n’ Andy, 1955; Buster Keaton Show (Life with Buster Keaton), 1952; Dennis the Menace, 1962-1963; Colgate Comedy Hour with Spike Jones, 1951 The Great Gildersleeve, 1955-1956; Green Acres (every episode is included), 1965-1971; Grindl, 1963-1964; My Friend Irma, 1952-1954; Petticoat Junction, 1963-1966; Peter Lind Hayes Show, 1950-1951. Additionally, there are two unproduced feature film screenplays. Hummingbird Hill, for Samuel Engel and 20th Century Fox, was meant to be a sequel to Sitting Pretty (1948) and was to go into production in 1961. The other film is The Great Untrained for 20th Century Fox, to star Pat Boone, and slated to shoot in 1961. Some other writers or co-writers whose work appears in this collection are Don Nelson, John L. Greene, Paul West, Joe Bigelow, Dick Chevillat, Jesse Goldstein, and Betty Boyle.