Shelley Berman was a great comedian. He usually did what he did seated on a stool but he was still one of the greatest "stand-up" comics of all time, pioneering so much in that field. His work was innovative, sincere and very funny, and an awful lot of great comics got into that profession because they saw Shelley Berman and said, "I want to do what that guy does!" He was also a superb actor — comic and otherwise — and a very human, compassionate (but perpetually nervous) man.
I have stories but I have deadlines. I'll try to write more about him over the weekend. Just for now, let me say that he was really, really important in the history of stand-up comedy and really, really difficult sometimes to talk to.