Bruce Jay Friedman (April 26, 1930 – June 3, 2020) was an American novelist, screenwriter, playwright, and actor.

His father, Irving, worked at a company selling women's apparel; his mother, Mollie (Liebowitz), was a regular theatergoer.

Writing in The Press Democrat, Isabelle Hoover said of the author: "His style is swift-moving, his story humorous and at the same time serious.

The pages of his short book are generously sprinkled with sex and the ubiquitous four letter words of modern writers.

"[6] Ron Martin began his review in The Detroit Free Press: "It is said that when Bruce Jay Friedman was graduated from DeWitt Clinton High School in New York City, he was voted the second funniest fellow in his class.

[1] It received an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay,[8] which Friedman shared with Brian Grazer, Lowell Ganz, and Babaloo Mandel.

[1] Friedman's collection of short fiction, Three Balconies, appeared in September 2008, from Biblioasis, who also published his 2011 memoir Lucky Bruce.

[10] Friedman was an early writer of modern American black humor, together with his peers Joseph Heller (also a close friend of his), Stanley Elkin, and Thomas Pynchon.

[1] Friedman was noted for his versatility of writing novels, short stories, plays, in addition to being a screenwriter and magazine editor.

[11] He frequently discussed how conflicted he felt in composing screenplays for profit and for pleasure, as opposed to his "higher calling" of authoring novels.

[8] Although Friedman eventually prevailed in the fistfight, he had to receive a tetanus shot after Mailer bit him in the neck.