Before he could join the team, however, he was drafted into the Army where he sang and did comedy in USO shows.
Athletics dominated his youth and, following high school, he tried out and won a contract with the Chicago White Sox. The family, including a brother, lived in the back room of the store. He certainly found his element on the live comedic stage, however, in between his offbeat on-camera assignments.īorn Richard Schulefand on December 1, 1923, in Buffalo, New York, Dick was raised in nearby Lackawanna where his father owned a clothing store. A counterculture favorite far ahead of his time, it became a hit-and-miss effort in proper vehicles for this man's eccentric genius.
As such, he proved to be rather an acquired taste on film and TV. One-of-a-kind comedian Dick Shawn was as intriguingly clever and off-the-wall as they came.
