Gil David Schwartz

Gil David Schwartz, former Chief Communications Officer at CBS, author, actor, playwright, musician, and all-around bon vivant, passed away at his home in Santa Monica on Saturday, May 2, 2020. He was 68 years old. The cause of death was cardiac arrest.

Gil was born in Manhattan, NY on May 20, 1951 to Bill and Ruth Schwartz. Raised in Highland Park, IL and New Rochelle, NY, Gil attended Brandeis University where he studied English and Theater. Gil’s life on the stage began as a child who shined in school plays and music recitals. This love of the spotlight carried through into his adult life. As a young man, he performed in the Utah Shakespeare Festival, and during his 20s in Boston, MA, he performed as an improv actor in The Proposition. He also co-founded his own troupe, The Next Move. He acted in several soap operas (often cast as “someone who looked like he would take a bribe”) and national and local commercials.

While pursuing acting, Gil wrote and produced plays, most notably Ferocious Kisses, “a showbiz thriller-farce” (The New York Times, 1982), which ran off Broadway at the Manhattan Punch Line Theater. He also began what would be a lifelong occupation as a magazine columnist, launching himself with Seventeen’s “Ask Gil,” a recurring feature in which he posed as a teenage boy offering dating advice. He transitioned to corporate life with a job in the communications department at Group W, a division of Westinghouse Broadcasting. After a series of corporate mergers and buyouts, Westinghouse became CBS Corporation, where Gil spent the majority of an illustrious near-40-year career.

Gil was more than just a beloved boss. "He was a counselor to senior management, a mentor to future PR executives and a popular presence in every hallway," CBS said in a statement. He was well known for his annual department Christmas fete, at which hundreds of people—executives, corporate employees, media reporters and CBS on-air talent—would gather to glad hand and kibitz over Gil’s signature party food: pigs-in-a-blanket. He was also famous across the industry for his colorful appearances at the network’s yearly affiliates meeting, where he relished the opportunity to get up in front of the large crowd to perform original songs with one of the many cherished guitars he kept in his sprawling personal collection.

While his corporate career skyrocketed, Gil was a writer at his core. He maintained a (poorly-kept) secret alter-ego, the satirical business humorist, Stanley Bing. Bing was prolific. He was a regular columnist for Esquire magazine, and then held the back page of Fortune for two decades. He published 13 business humor books, as well as three novels, the most recent being Immortal Life in 2017.

Gil was not just a big macher—he was a renaissance man in the true meaning of the phrase. An aesthete, a joker, an appreciator of both low and high art, he was just as likely to expound upon Kurosawa or Kierkegaard as he was Michael Bay or Bugs Bunny. He loved art, film, literature, poetry, and music. He could quote Shakespeare at will (and with feeling) and could do a mean Don Corleone. He spent hours of his life devoted to the mastery of video games across platforms and generations. He was a world-class folk and blues guitarist and played Chopin ballades on his Steinway, as well as silly, extemporaneous ditties about spaniels to entertain his kids and grandkids. Gil was an avid and accomplished photographer who filled shelves full of books with his images of birds, landscapes, mannequins, food, and cities across the world. He adored a restaurant like no one else ever could: a gift to waiters and bartenders everywhere. Dining out with Gil was like being taken to dinner by Bacchus himself. Countless wonderful nights were shared with family and friends, celebrating, drinking and eating until closing time.

More than anything, though, Gil loved his family. He is survived by his wife of 14 years, Laura Svienty; his children, Nina Pajak (Matt Pajak), Will Schwartz (Jean Moylan); his stepchildren, Kyle Bender and Rachel Bender; his grandchildren, Vivien Pajak and Sam Pajak; his brother Michael Schwartz (Trisha Schwartz) and niece Brianna Schwartz. He was an adoring husband and the best father any of his children could have asked for—a mentor and shepherd to them when they were young, a friend and confidant when they were adults. He loved every dog who ever lived. He was a brilliant and rare gem on this Earth, a bright light in the life of all he touched, and he will be dearly missed.

In honor of Gil’s lifelong desire to feed everyone, memorial contributions may be made to: lafoodbank.org, foodbanknyc.org or sfmfoodbank.org