Fred Ebb (April 8, 1928 – September 11, 2004)[1] was an American musical theatre lyricist who had many successful collaborations with composer John Kander.

He worked during the early 1950s bronzing baby shoes, as a trucker's assistant, and was also employed in a department store credit office and at a hosiery company.

[3] Another song Ebb wrote with Springer was "Heartbroken" (1953), which was recorded by Judy Garland, the mother of his future protégée, Liza Minnelli.

Fred Ebb was the voice of the "Little Blue Man", on Betty Johnson's novelty song from 1958, repeating the words: "I Rov You... to Bits".

However, the quality of the score convinced producer Harold Prince to hire them for their first professional production, the George Abbott-directed musical Flora the Red Menace (1965), based on Lester Atwell's novel Love is Just Around the Corner.

Directed by Prince and based on the John Van Druten play I Am a Camera (which, in turn, was based on the writing of Christopher Isherwood), the musical starred Jill Haworth as Sally Bowles, Bert Convy as Clifford Bradshaw, Lotte Lenya as Fräulein Schneider and Joel Grey as the emcee.

[14] Zorba (1968), directed by Prince, also ran less than a year, though it was more successful in its 1983 revival;[15] and 70, Girls, 70 (1971), which was originally intended as an off-Broadway production, closed after 35 performances.

The show featured Sinatra and guest star Gene Kelly in duet on the song "Can't Do That Anymore", written by Ebb for his abandoned musical with Kander and Dale Wasserman, Wait for Me, World!.

Starring Chita Rivera, Jerry Orbach and Gwen Verdon in her last Broadway role, it suffered from a cynical attitude, which contrasted with the record-breaking popularity of A Chorus Line.

[27] Following the closure of the show after six months, Kander and Ebb would not produce new material, save for a song in Hay Fever in 1985, for nine years.

Over & Over, an adaptation of the Thornton Wilder play The Skin of Our Teeth, was performed at the Signature Theatre in Arlington, Virginia in 1999[31] and was revamped for a 2007 staging by the Westport Country Playhouse under the title All About Us.

Through in-depth primary research and interviews with writers, producers, and various musical theater collaborators, Leve introduces the writing process of Kander and Ebb and explores the many revisions and stagings of their shows as each work moved from tryouts to Broadway.

The musical had its world premiere at the Ahmanson Theater in Los Angeles in July 2006, and ran on Broadway at the Al Hirschfeld Theatre from March 2007 through June 2008.

[38] At its 2007 ceremony, the Drama Desk honored Kander and the late Ebb with a special award for "42 years of excellence in advancing the art of the musical theater.

[41] Ebb is interred in a mausoleum with Edwin “Eddie” Aldridge (1929–1997) and Martin Cohen (1926–1995) on the banks of Sylvan Water at Green-Wood Cemetery, a National Historic Landmark in Brooklyn, New York.