Robert van Scoyk

Robert van Scoyk (January 13, 1928 - August 23, 2002) was a television writer, producer and story editor active during the "Golden Age of Television" from the late 1940s until the late 1990s.

Beginning in New York and moving to Los Angeles in the 1960s, his credits included The Virginian, Banacek, Young Maverick, Flying High, Rafferty, Ellery Queen and Murder, She Wrote.

In 1979 Robert van Scoyk received an Edgar Allan Poe Award for the Columbo episode Murder Under Glass

Life and career

Born in Dayton, Ohio, van Scoyk served in the United States Army Air Corps during the last months of World War II. He attended Columbia and New York Universities and began his career in television by working as a pageboy at NBC studios.^[1][2]

New York

At that time he was also writing a column for the Dayton Daily News, about life as a struggling radio and TV writer in Manhattan. New York gossip columnist Earl Wilson helped his career by regularly recounting van Scoyk's adventures in his own column.^[1]

Van Scoyk’s break came when he wrote a script for NBC's The New Faces, a revue show produced by the NBC pages in the late 1940s. He went on to write for The Ann Sothern Show, The Imogene Coca Show, U.S. Steel Hour, Philco Theatre and Kraft Theatre, as well as Ivanhoe and The Betty Hutton Show.^[1][3]

Los Angeles

In the 1960s van Scoyk moved to Los Angeles where he wrote, adapted, produced and story edited a wide range of TV series and made-for-television movies, equally at home with comedy, Western, musical comedy, melodrama, medical drama, mystery and detective genres.

He is perhaps best remembered for his involvement as writer, producer, executive producer and/or story editor for such shows as The Virginian, Banacek, Young Maverick, Flying High, Rafferty, Ellery Queen and, for the 12 years of its 1984-96 run and after, Murder, She Wrote.^[3][4]

In 1979 Robert van Scoyk received an Edgar Allan Poe Award from the Mystery Writers of America for the Columbo episode Murder Under Glass, starring Peter Falk and Louis Jourdan.^[2]

Death

Robert van Scoyk died in Los Angeles, California on August 23, 2002 of complication from diabetes. He was 74.

He was survived by his wife of 30 years, Leona Plotkin Van Scoyk, sons Robert, Andy, and Matt Tyrnauer, his father Robert, and sister Lois.^[2]

Additional credits (partial)

(Also credited as Bob van Scoyk and Rovert van Scoyk.)

TV adaptation of Kiss Me, Kate (1968) starring Robert Goulet and Carol Lawrence for ABC

Love, Sidney starring Tony Randall

All's Fair starring Richard Crenna and Bernadette Peters

His other writings were represented in anthologies, including Best Short Stories of 1958, and he was a contributor to periodicals, including Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine and The Humanist.^[4]

References