Shelley Berman Guest of Honor at Doo Dah Parade
Shelley Berman
The Ocean City Doo Dah Parade has announced that comedian and actor Shelley Berman will be the honored guest at the City’s 25th annual Doo Dah Parade set for Saturday, April 17, starting at noon.
Active in show business for over 60 years, the 84-year-old Berman has appeared most recently on TV with roles on Boston Legal, Entourage, CSI: NY and on HBO’S Curb Your Enthusiasm, for which he received a 2008 Emmy nomination.
Berman has also been featured in many movies including The Holiday with Cameron Diaz and Jack Black; Meet the Fockers with Robert DeNiro and Ben Stiller; You Don’t Mess with the Zohan with Adam Sandler and The Best Man with Henry Fonda.
Berman earned his first acclaim as a ground-breaking comedian. While working in New York as a writer for Steve Allen, Berman received an invitation to join the Compass Players in Chicago. This group later evolved in the famed Second City ensemble. Here he worked with such legendary performers as Mike Nichols, Elaine May and Barbara Harris among others.
While performing with the Compass Players, the comedian began developing solo pieces employing an imaginary telephone to take the place of an on stage partner. While watching Mort Sahl’s act at Mister Kelly’s in Chicago, he realized he didn’t have to tell traditional jokes like other comedians of the day. He could just talk to himself.
His unusual monologues caught on and soon he was performing throughout the country appearing on national television and recording his routines for Verve Records.
Inside Shelley Berman, released in 1959, became the first comedy album awarded a gold record and the first non-musical recording to win a Grammy.
The City’s 25th Annual Doo Dah Parade will be dedicated to Soupy Sales, a great friend of Ocean City, who passed away late last year. The comedy program held after the Parade will feature a recreation of the Ed Sullivan Toast of the Town Show. Berman, impersonators of legendary comedians and others will pay tribute to Soupy. Trudy Sales, Soupy’s wife and a former June Taylor dancer, will be grand marshal of the parade.
