Radio, Songwriting, and Screenwriting
During the 1930s, Amsterdam was a regular on The Al Pearce Show radio program, and by 1937 was the master of ceremonies on The Night Club of the Air.
Amsterdam also had a notable career as a songwriter, with his first popular success being "Why Oh Why Did I Ever Leave Wyoming." Amsterdam's most famous achievement as a songwriter was as the credited lyricist on the 1945 Andrews Sisters hit "Rum and Coca-Cola". However, the original version of the song (which Amsterdam did not write) was performed by a Trinidadian calypso singer named Lord Invader, and Amsterdam was subsequently involved in a copyright suit over the song, which dragged on until 1948. In the end, Lord Invader was given a substantial royalty payment for having written the original lyric to the piece, while Amsterdam retained the credit (and the publishing rights) for his revised version of the lyric.
In the early 1940s, he was a screenwriter, contributing dialogue for two East Side Kids films.
By 1947, he was performing on three daily radio shows. Beginning in 1948, he appeared on the radio show Stop Me If You've Heard This One. The Morey Amsterdam Show aired on CBS radio from July 10, 1948 to February 15, 1949. For three months, it was on both radio and TV, using different scripts with the same premise and cast.
Read more about this topic: Morey Amsterdam