James Wolcott awards a Tip of the Hat (not a Wag of the Finger) for background information on his recent column on Mort Sahl to “a now mostly forgotten New Yorker writer named Robert Rice” for his July 30, 1960, profile of Sahl. Wolcott, who calls the piece “fascinating,” notes that Rice also wrote a profile on Nichols and May; I would only add that he did others on Dave Brubeck, Leonard Bernstein, and Branch Rickey, as well as a whole slew of enthralling-sounding NYC-related profiles (or rather, Profiles) and stuff in other departments.
Is anyone out there familiar with Rice? We’d love to hear about it. Perhaps he was the Calvin Tomkins or Lawrence Weschler of his day! —Martin Schneider