Bill Zehme, 64, was a celebrity biographer best known for his books on Frank Sinatra and Johnny Carson. He died Sunday March 26, 2023.

Quotable Quotes:

"I have the disposition of a psychoanalyst," he once said. "I can talk to people. I like to ask questions. I like to fathom what it's like to be them. You have to be very empathic. You have to be ready to understand what people are about. I strike some sort of a balance where I can play with people and at the same time, ideally, they reveal things about themselves." "Life is a tidal wave. It's a wave you're caught in and the waves have just taken me where they've taken me.

"I'm generally an abuser of deadlines. I'm so late with this Johnny Carson [biography] it's like I'm setting a new record for being late with a book. At this point I'm looking at the Guinness Book of World Records to see how many years it will have to be before I [set the record.]"

"The truth is, I have never written about a celebrity. I have always written about humans, replete with human traits and foibles and issues, who also happen to be famous."