James B. Allardice

James B. Allardice was born in Canton, Ohio, the son of James and Lula Allardice. He attended the College of Wooster where he wrote musicals with James Wise, who later wrote the Broadway musical, "Dames at Sea." While serving in World War II, Allardice wrote the play, "At War with the Army." Following the war, he studied playwriting at Yale, where "At War with the Army" was first produced. In 1949, the play opened on Broadway. The play was bought by Paramount, and so Allardice moved to Hollywood to work on the movie. Although they had been in two earlier movies, At War with the Army (1950) was the first movie in which the comedy team of Jerry Lewis and Dean Martin received top billing. In the early 50s, Allardice wrote original hour-long dramas which appeared on such shows as the _"General Electric Theater" (1954)_ and the Lux Video Theatre (1950). He moved on to write variety shows, including The Tennessee Ernie Ford Show (1956) and The George Gobel Show (1954), for which he won an Emmy for Best Comedy Writing in 1955. On the set of "Ann Sothern Show, The" (1958), Allardice met composer 'Tom Adair', and soon after, the two began writing sitcoms, including Hogan's Heroes (1965), My Three Sons (1960), and The Munsters (1964). Allardice is perhaps best known for writing the introductions for Alfred Hitchcock Presents (1955) which were performed by Alfred Hitchcock. Not only did Allardice write the lead-ins for all 359 episodes of the show, he wrote many of Hitchcock's speeches during the ten years of their collaboration. In 1966, Allardice died of a heart attack at the age of 46, and that year, "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" ended its ten year run.