In 1962, Stiller and Meara were invited to bring their sketch comedy to Sullivan’s much-watched variety show.
Their “breakthrough” skit, Stiller wrote in his 2000 memoir, “Married to Laughter,” played off their contrasting Irish and Jewish backgrounds. In it, Stiller’s Hershey Horowitz and Meara’s Mary Elizabeth Doyle are fixed up by a dating service and struggle to find someone they know in common.
Meara: “Hey, do you know Richie Flanagan?”
Stiller: “No. Do you know Moishe Bader?”
Stiller appeared in films such as “The Taking of Pelham One Two Three,” “Hairspray” and “Zoolander,” directed by and starring his son.
Meara died in 2015.
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.