One year ago: David Lloyd

This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.

David Lloyd, the father of television writer and producer Christopher Lloyd, was a television comedy writer who wrote the classic ‘Chuckles Bites the Dust’ episode of ‘The Mary Tyler Moore Show.’ He died of prostate cancer one year ago at age 75.

[For the record at 2:28 p.m.: An earlier version of this post stated the David Lloyd was the father of actor Christopher Lloyd. He was the father of television writer and producer Christopher Lloyd.]

Lloyd’s four-decade comedy career included writing for ‘The Tonight Show,’ ‘Frasier,’ ‘Taxi’ and ‘Cheers’ among others. His famous ‘Chuckles Bites the Dust’ episode of ‘The Mary Tyler Moore Show’ earned him an Emmy award in 1976.

‘If you consider how long his career was and how much he wrote for such really popular shows, he’s got to have been responsible for a record number of laughs in this world,’ said Les Charles, co-creator of ‘Cheers.’

He was known for being both a quality and a quick-writing comedian. Allan Burns, co-creator of ‘The Mary Tyler Moore Show,’ called Lloyd a ‘one-man writing staff.’

Lloyd was born in Bronxville, N.Y., and studied English at Yale. After graduating in 1956, he served in the Navy and began teaching English at Rutgers Preparatory School in New Jersey before making his break into television.

For more, read David Lloyd’s obituary by The Times.

-- Michael Farr