Henry Slesar (June 12, 1927 – April 2, 2002) was an American author and playwright. He is famous for his use of irony and twist endings. After reading Slesar's "M Is for the Many" in Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, Alfred Hitchcock bought it for adaptation and they began many successful collaborations. Slesar wrote hundreds of scripts for television series and soap operas, leading TV Guide to call him "the writer with the largest audience in America."
Life Henry Slesar was born in Brooklyn, New York City. His parents were Jewish immigrants from Ukraine, and he had two sisters named Doris and Lillian. After graduating from the School of Industrial Art, he found he had a talent for ad copy and design, which launched his twenty-year career as a copywriter at the age of 17. He was hired right out of school to work for the prominent advertising agency Young & Rubicam.
It has been claimed that the term "coffee break" was coined by Slesar and that he was also the person behind McGraw-Hill's massively popular "The Man in the Chair" advertising campaign.
After World War II, Slesar served in the United States Army Air Force, which influenced his story "The Delegate from Venus". Afterwards, he opened his own agency.
Slesar was married three times: to Oenone Scott, 1953–1969; to Jan Maakestad, 1970–1974; and to Manuela Jone in 1974. He had one daughter and one son.
Pseudonyms In addition to writing chiefly under his own name, Slesar published under several pseudonyms, particularly on early short stories. These included:
Clyde Mitchell – a Ziff Davis "house pseudonym" used by some science fiction and fantasy authors in Amazing Stories and Fantastic, which were edited by Paul W. Fairman. (Authors publishing as Clyde Mitchell include Robert Silverberg, Randall Garrett, Harlan Ellison, and others.) Slesar used the Mitchell name for "The Monster Died at Dawn" in Amazing Stories (November, 1956), and "A Kiss for the Conqueror" in Fantastic (February, 1957). O. H. Leslie – Slesar chose this name, which he used from 1956 to 1964, again for Paul Fairman as well as other magazines. In Amazing Stories he published such stories as "Marriages Are Made in Detroit" (December 1956), "Reluctant Genius" (January 1957), "No Room in Heaven" (June 1957), "The Anonymous Man" (July 1957), and "The Seven Eyes of Jonathan Dark" (January 1959). In Fantastic he published such stories as "Death Rattle" (December 1956), "My Robot" (February 1957), "Abe Lincoln—Android" (April 1957), "The Marriage Machine" (July 1957), and "Inheritance" (August 1957).
Ivar Jorgensen – This pseudonym, a house name, was also used by Robert Silverberg, Randall Garrett, Harlan Ellison, Howard Browne, and Paul Fairman himself. Slesar's use of the name appeared in Fantastic for "Coward's Death" (December 1956) and "Tailor-Made Killers" (August 1957). E. K. Jarvis – another Ziff Davis house name, also used by Robert Silverberg, Harlan Ellison, Paul W. Fairman, Robert Bloch, and Robert Moore Williams. Slesar used it for "Get Out of Our Skies!" in Amazing Stories (December 1957). Lawrence Chandler – Another Ziff Davis house name, shared by Howard Browne, Slesar used it for "Tool of the Gods" in Fantastic (November 1957). Sley Harson – Nearly an anagram of Slesar's name, he used it in collaboration with his friend Harlan Ellison. Together they published "Sob Story" in The Deadly Streets (Ace Books, 1958). Gerald Vance – Another Ziff Davis house name; shared by William P. McGivern, Rog Phillips, Robert Silverberg and Randall Garrett. Slesar sold the story "The Lavender Talent" to Paul Fairman at Fantastic (March 1958). Jeff Heller – A pen name he used when collaborating with his friend, M*A*S*H writer Jay Folb. Eli Jerome - A pen name derived from the first names of his two brothers-in-law, the husbands of his sister Doris Greenberg and his sister Lillian Gleich. Used in various stories in Alfred Hitchcock collections and 2 teleplays on Alfred Hitchcock Presents ("Party Line" and "One Grave Too Many", both 1960).
Other house names Slesar employed were Jay Street, John Murray, and Lee Saber.
After 1958, he wrote chiefly under his own name.
Career In 1955, he published his first short story, "The Brat" (Imaginative Tales, September, 1955). While working as a copywriter, he published hundreds of short stories—over forty in 1957 alone—including detective fiction, science fiction, criminal stories, mysteries, and thrillers in such publications as Playboy, Imaginative Tales, and Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine; he was writing, on average, one story per week. Alfred Hitchcock hired him to write a number of the scenarios for Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Two of his stories were adapted for the fifth season (1963–64) of Rod Serling's original Twilight Zone series, though Slesar did not write the teleplays. Much later, Slesar's short story "Examination Day" was used in the 1980s Twilight Zone revival.
His first novel-length work was 20 Million Miles to Earth, a 1957 novelization of the film. In 1960, his first novel, The Gray Flannel Shroud (1958), a murder mystery set in an advertising agency, earned the Edgar Allan Poe Award.
Perhaps his most often-recurring character was the wannabe criminal Ruby Martinson, who starred in fourteen Hitchcock's stories between 1957 and 1968. These comedic jaunts, in which Martinson and the narrator—his weak-willed, chronically unemployed cousin Joey—would inevitably attempt an overambitious crime and never successfully profit, were especially popular in Germany and Japan, inspiring respectively the television series Parole Chicago and the film Kaitō Ruby.
Domestically, Slesar also adapted one of his Amazing Science Fiction stories, "Legacy of Terror," for the screenplay of the 1965 film Two on a Guillotine.
In 1974, he won an Emmy Award as the head writer for CBS Daytime's The Edge of Night. His term as head writer (1968–84) was considered lengthy. Chris Schemering writes in The Soap Opera Encyclopedia, "Slesar proved a master of the serial format, creating a series of bizarre, intricate plots of offbeat characters in the spirit of the irreverent detective movies of the '40s." During that time, he was also head writer for the Procter & Gamble soap operas Somerset (on NBC Daytime) and Search for Tomorrow until John William Corrington replaced him on the latter. During the 1974–75 television season, he was the creator and head writer for Executive Suite, a CBS primetime series.
He wrote mainly science-fiction scripts for the CBS Radio Mystery Theater during the 1970s.
In 1983, Procter & Gamble wanted to replace him as the head writer for The Edge of Night, but ABC/ABC Daytime kept him. After his eventual replacement as head writer by Lee Sheldon, the network named him and Sam Hall the new head writers of its soap opera One Life to Live, but he left that show after only one year. He was later the head writer of the CBS Daytime series Capitol.
His last novel was Murder at Heartbreak Hospital (). It is based on his experiences as a writer for soaps. A homicide detective investigates murders on the set of a soap opera and meets a variety of amusing characters, including the bland leading man, a rapacious starlet, a couple of gay teleplay writers, and some executives. As so many of his works did, it features a twist ending. It was originally published in Europe in 1990 and the American version retains British spellings and some errors (possibly Slesar's, as when the detective's name is wrongly given in chapter three). The novel was adapted into a film, Heartbreak Hospital, by Ruedi Gerber in 2002; it starred John Shea as Milo, the leading man, Diane Venora as his wife, and Patricia Clarkson as Lottie.
Other late works included "interactive mystery serial" stories for MysteryNet.com, which invited readers to contribute their ideas.
Bibliography
Novels
The Gray Flannel Shroud. New York: Random House, 1959. (Series: A Random House mystery) Enter Murderers. New York: Random House, 1960. (Series: A Random House mystery) The Bridge of Lions. New York: Macmillan, 1963. The Thing at the Door. New York: Random House, 1974. () Murder at Heartbreak Hospital. Chicago, Ill.: Academy Chicago Publishers, 1998.
Short fiction Collections Clean Crimes and Neat Murders: Alfred Hitchcock's Hand Picked Selection of Stories by Henry Slesar. Introduction by Alfred Hitchcock. New York: Avon, 1960. Cover title: A Bouquet of Clean Crimes and Neat Murders. Spine title: Alfred Hitchcock Presents Clean Crimes and Neat Murders. A Crime for Mothers and Others. New York, N.Y.: Avon, 1962. Murders Most Macabre. New York, N.Y.: Avon, 1986. (paperback; ) Death on Television: The Best of Henry Slesar's Alfred Hitchcock Stories. Edited by Francis M. Nevins Jr. and Martin H. Greenberg. Introduction by Henry Slesar. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1989. ()
StoriesShort stories unless otherwise noted. TitleYearFirst publishedReprinted/collectedNotesDeuce1991Examination Day1985The dinner party2001 The museum2000
"A Cry from the Penthouse" (1959) – Originally published in Playboy, November, 1959. Anthologized in: Alfred Hitchcock Presents Stories for Late at Night, 1961 and AHP: More Stories for Late at Night, 1962. "A God Named Smith" (1957) – Originally published in Amazing Stories, July, 1957. Later collected with Worlds of the Imperium, by Keith Laumer, as Armchair Fiction Double Novel #51, 2012, . "Abe Lincoln – Android" (1957) – As by O. H. Leslie. Originally published in Fantastic, April, 1957. Anthologized in: Great Science Fiction, No. 6, 1967. "Bats" (1989) – The Further Adventures of Batman, 1989, ed. Martin H. Greenberg, . "Before the Talent Dies" (1957) – Originally published in Venture Science Fiction, September, 1957. Anthologized in: No Limits, 1964, ed. Joseph W. Ferman; and in Supermen, 1984, ed. Isaac Asimov, Martin H. Greenberg, Charles G. Waugh, . "Behind the Screen" (1993) – The Further Adventures of Wonder Woman, 1993, ed. Martin H. Greenberg, . "Brother Robot" (1958) – Originally published in Amazing Science Fiction Stories, May, 1958. Anthologized in: Uncollected Stars, 1986, ed. Piers Anthony, Barry N. Malzberg, Martin H. Greenberg, Charles G. Waugh, ; and in Robots, 1989, ed. Charles G. Waugh, Isaac Asimov, Martin H. Greenberg, . "Chief" (1960) – The 6th Annual of the Year's Best S-F, 1961, ed. Judith Merril; 100 Great Science Fiction Short Short Stories, 1980, ed. Isaac Asimov, Martin Greenberg, Joseph D. Olander, ; and others. "Cop for a Day" (1957) – Originally published in Manhunt, January 1957. Anthologized in: The Young Oxford Book of Nasty Endings, 1997, ed. Dennis Pepper, .
"Ersatz" (1967) – Dangerous Visions, 1967, ed. Harlan Ellison. "Examination Day" (1958) – Originally published in Playboy, February 1958. Frequently anthologized; some include School and Society Through Science Fiction, 1974, ed. Patricia Warrick, Martin H. Greenberg, Joseph D. Olander, ; Inside Information: Computers in Fiction, edited by Abbe Mowshowitz; Beyond Time and Space, 1978, ed. Robert R. Potter, ; Realms of Darkness, 1985, ed. Mary Danby, ; New Stories from the Twilight Zone, 1993, ed. Martin H. Greenberg, ; 100 Hair Raising Little Horror Stories, 1993, ed. Al Sarrantonio, Martin H. Greenberg, ; and Beware!: R. L. Stine Picks His Favorite Scary Stories, 2002, ed. R. L. Stine, . "40 Detectives Later" – in 100 Menacing Little Murder Stories, 1998, ed. Robert Weinberg, Stefan Dziemianowicz, Martin H. Greenberg, .
"I Now Pronounce You Superman and Wife" (1993) The Further Adventures of Superman, 1993, ed. Martin H. Greenberg, . "Job Offer" (1959) – Originally published in Satellite Science Fiction, April, 1959. Anthologized in: 101 Science Fiction Stories, 1986, ed. Martin H. Greenberg, Charles G. Waugh, Jenny-Lynn Waugh, .