Bruce Jay Friedman facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Bruce Jay Friedman
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Friedman in 2014
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| Born | April 26, 1930 The Bronx, New York City, U.S.
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| Died | June 3, 2020 (aged 90) Brooklyn, New York City, U.S
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| Alma mater | University of Missouri (BA) |
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| Spouse(s) |
Ginger Howard
(m. 1954; div. 1978)Patricia O'Donohue
(m. 1983) |
| Children | 4, including Josh Alan and Drew Friedman |
Bruce Jay Friedman (born April 26, 1930 – died June 3, 2020) was a talented American writer. He wrote many different kinds of stories, including novels, screenplays for movies, and plays for the theater. He was also an actor. Friedman was known for his unique writing style, especially his use of "black humor." This is a type of comedy that deals with serious or dark topics in a funny way. His stories often showed the big changes happening in society during the 1960s and 1970s. Many of his ideas came from his own life experiences.
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Growing Up in New York City
Bruce Jay Friedman was born in New York City on April 26, 1930. He grew up in a part of New York called The Bronx with his sister, Dollie. His family was Jewish. His father, Irving, sold women's clothes, and his mother, Mollie, loved going to the theater.
Bruce went to DeWitt Clinton High School. After high school, he tried to get into Columbia University but didn't succeed. Instead, he studied journalism at the University of Missouri.
Starting His Writing Journey
After college, Friedman joined the United States Air Force. He wrote for a military newspaper called Air Training. While he was there, one of his officers gave him three famous books: The Catcher in the Rye, Of Time and the River, and From Here to Eternity. Bruce read all three books in about a weekend. This experience made him realize he wanted to be a writer.
Friedman's Creative Career
After two years in the military, Friedman returned to The Bronx. He wrote his first short story, "Wonderful Golden Rule Days," and sold it to The New Yorker magazine. In 1954, he started working for Magazine Management Company. Here, he worked for many popular men's magazines of that time. He eventually became an executive editor, in charge of magazines like Men, Male, and Man's World.
Becoming a Famous Author
In 1962, Friedman published his first novel, Stern. People noticed his funny writing style right away. He quickly followed this with another novel, A Mother's Kisses (1964), and his first play, Scuba Duba (1967). These three works were very successful. In 1968, The New York Times Magazine called him "The Hottest Writer of the Year."
After the 1970s, Friedman started focusing more on writing screenplays for movies. In 1980, he wrote the script for Stir Crazy. This movie became the third highest-earning film in the U.S. that year. Four years later, he wrote the first version of the movie Splash. This movie was even nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay. Friedman shared this nomination with Brian Grazer, Lowell Ganz, and Babaloo Mandel.
Later Works and Acting
Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, Friedman wrote several more novels. Critics respected these books, but some felt they weren't as new or exciting as his earlier works.
Friedman also appeared in some movies as an actor. He was in Woody Allen's film Another Woman in 1988. He also acted in two other Woody Allen movies: Husbands and Wives (1992) and Celebrity (1998).
In 2008, a collection of his short stories called Three Balconies was published. In 2011, he released his memoir, Lucky Bruce, which is a book about his own life. A collection of four of his plays, titled 3.1 Plays, came out in 2012.
Friedman's Unique Writing Style
Bruce Jay Friedman was one of the first writers to use modern American "black humor." Other writers who used this style included his close friend Joseph Heller, Stanley Elkin, and Thomas Pynchon. This style got its name partly from a 1965 book of stories that Friedman edited, also called Black Humor. When asked if he invented the term, he said he wasn't sure.
The New York Times described Friedman as a writer who used "deadpan prose." This means he wrote in a serious, straight-faced way, even when talking about funny or strange things. He was also called a "savage social satirist," meaning he used humor to criticize society.
His stories often explored the big social changes of the 1960s and 1970s. He used his own life experiences to write about topics like relationships between different races and genders. For example, the crowded apartment in his novel A Mother's Kisses was like the small apartment he grew up in. Also, the main character in that book was rejected by Columbia University, just like Friedman was. His short story "A Change of Plan" was inspired by his own honeymoon in Florida.
Friedman was very good at writing many different things. He wrote novels, short stories, plays, and screenplays. He was also a magazine editor. He often talked about how he felt torn between writing screenplays for money and writing novels for his true passion. He once said about screenplays, "Take the money, scribble a bit, and enjoy the room service."
His Family Life and Passing
Bruce Jay Friedman married Ginger Howard in 1954. They had three sons together: Josh, Kipp, and Drew. They divorced in 1978.
Five years later, in 1983, he married Patricia O'Donohue. They stayed married until his death. They had one daughter, Molly.
Bruce Jay Friedman passed away on June 3, 2020, at his home in Brooklyn. He was 90 years old. He had been dealing with a nerve condition called neuropathy for several years. His wife, Patricia, said he had been in the hospital a month before his death for an infection that was not related to COVID-19.
