Simon views life as a mixture of the sad and funny, and drama as a reflection of life.
Marvin Neil Simon was born in the Bronx, New York City, to Mamie and Irving Simon (a garment salesman). Nicknamed "Doc" because of his examining the family with a toy stethoscope as a child, Simon grew up in New York City, the setting for nearly all of his plays. One of his early childhood memories defines the outlook of his playwriting career. Once he climbed up on a stone ledge to sneak a look at an outdoor movie--a Charlie Chaplin film. "I laughed so hard I fell off, cut my head open and was taken to the doctor, bleeding and laughing .... My idea of the ultimate achievement in a comedy is to make a whole audience fall onto the floor, writhing and laughing so hard that some of them pass out." As an accomplished playwright, Simon understands the connection between pain and laughter. He apparently approves of his nickname Doc, for the implied comparison between the work of a playwright and the function of a doctor--to relieve suffering. That the central character in one of his later plays, The Good Doctor (1973), is both a physician and a playwright seems in retrospect inevitable.
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