Phil Silvers

Silvers spent nearly sixty years as an entertainer, but is remembered above all for a single role: Master Sergeant Ernie Bilko, the scheming army con man he played on The Phil Silvers Show, which won him two Primetime Emmy Awards. He also won two Tony Awards, for Top Banana and A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, appeared in the ensemble comedy It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, and wrote the original lyrics to the jazz standard "Nancy (with the Laughing Face)."