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) Harmetz argues that they "brought to a dozen small roles in "Casablanca" an understanding and a desperation that could never have come from Central Casting". They were frequently cast as Nazis in war films, even though many were Jewish. The comedian Jack Benny may have had an unbilled cameo role, as was claimed by a contemporary newspaper advertisement and in the "Casablanca" press book. When asked in his column "Movie Answer Man", critic Roger Ebert first replied, "It looks something like him. That's all I can say." In a later column, he responded to a follow-up commenter, "I think you're