Casablanca (film) in 1942 to work on the "Why We Fight" series in Washington, D.C. While they were gone, the other credited writer, Howard Koch, was assigned; he produced thirty to forty pages. When the Epstein brothers returned after about a month, they were reassigned to "Casablanca" and—contrary to what Koch claimed in two published books—his work was not used. The Epstein brothers and Koch never worked in the same room at the same time during the writing of the script. Koch later commented, "When we began, we didn't have a finished script ... Ingrid Bergman came to me and said, 'Which
Casablanca (film) quality as "of the best" and the cast's performances as "all of the first order". The trade paper "Variety" commended the film's "combination of fine performances, engrossing story and neat direction" and the "variety of moods, action, suspense, comedy and drama that makes "Casablanca" an A-1 entry at the b.o." "Film is splendid anti-Axis propaganda, particularly inasmuch as the propaganda is strictly a by-product of the principal action and contributes to it instead of getting in the way." The review also applauded the performances of Bergman and Henreid and noted that "Bogart, as might be expected, is more at ease