George Shapiro graduated from New York University with a degree in advertising and marketing and, soon after, took a job in the mailroom at the William Morris Agency in New York. He advanced rapidly within the company and soon became an agent. One of his first assignments was to accompany Elvis Presley during his appearances on "The Ed Sullivan Show." Eventually he began packaging hit programs such as "The Steve Allen Show" , "That Girl" starring Marlo Thomas, and "Gomer Pyle" starring his client, Jim Nabors. He also packaged a number of specials for Dick Van Dyke, Mary Tyler Moore and Carol Channing. Shapiro later left the Morris Agency to become a personal manager and producer along with his partner and friend, Howard West. They formed Shapiro/West Productions and exective produced the Emmy, Peabody, and Golden Globe award winning series. "Seinfeld". Shapiro was Andy Kaufman's personal manager for many years, executive producing the comedian's special for showtime entitled "Andy Kaufman at Carnegie Hall" and one for ABC, "The Andy Kaufman Show." He also was executive producer with Howard West on the Universal feature film "Man on the Moon" starring Jim Carrey in the role of Andy Kaufman. Danny DeVito co-starred in the role of George Shapiro for Academy Award winning director, Milos Forman. An interesting sidebar, "Man On The Moon" repsesents Shapiro and West's joint debut as feature film actors. George played the role of Mr. Besserman, a club owner who fired Andy Kaufman early in his career and West portrayed a hard nosed network executve.
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