Pat McCormick, a veteran comedian and comedy writer who made scores of appearances on “The Tonight Show” with Johnny Carson, was a regular guest on “The Gong Show,” and appeared in three “Smokey and the Bandit” movies, died Friday at the Motion Picture & Television Hospital in the Woodland Hills section of Los Angeles. He was 78.

McCormick entered the facility in 1998 after suffering a stroke that left him partially paralyzed and unable to speak.

The walrus-mustachioed McCormick had a gift for wacky and sometimes warped humor. Some of his tamer lines went like this:

On the television writers strike in 1988:

“We writers will know we’re missed when we see our pictures on milk cartons.”

On going on the wagon:

“I gave up drinking booze when my liver started showing up on airport metal detectors.”

And a classic joke that Carson delivered after a big temblor hit the L.A. area:

“Due to today’s earthquake, the God is Dead rally has been canceled.”

In his sketches on the Carson show, Mc-Cormick played several human characters but dressed in costume to play a variety of wildlife including turkeys, peacocks, squirrels, and the shark from Jaws.

McCormick was born in Lakewood, Ohio, on June 30, 1927. He was a champion hurdler in high school and served in the Army from 1946 to 1948. After military service, he graduated from Harvard College. A year into studies at Harvard Law School, he dropped out to work in advertising in New York City.

But his advertising career was short-lived after he began making money writing comedy material for television and nightclub performers who included Jonathan Winters, Henny Youngman, and Phyllis Diller. He also briefly did a stand-up act with Marc London, whom he had known from Harvard.

Eventually, he became a full-time writer for “The Jack Paar Show,” the start of a comedy-writing career that spanned five decades. He wrote for Merv Griffin, Red Skelton, Danny Kaye, and both wrote and appeared on “Candid Camera.”

On television, McCormick served as announcer/straight man on Don Rickles’s short-lived variety show in 1968, and in 1972, he was a regular on “The New Bill Cosby Show.” He also was a key player in the legendary Friar’s Club Roasts for several years.

In addition to his role as “Big Enos Burdette” opposite Burt Reynolds in the “Smokey and the Bandit” films, McCormick was in two Robert Altman movies: “Buffalo Bill and the Indians,” in which he played President Cleveland, and “A Wedding,” in which he played wealthy industrialist Mackenzie “Mac” Goddard, husband of the character played by Dina Merrill.

Comedic actor Jack Riley, who played the part of Elliot Carlin on “The Bob Newhart Show,” said McCormick’s “mind went to places that most people’s don’t …truly original places where poets are found.

“I was walking with Pat one night outside of the Braille Institute on Ventura Boulevard. Pat looked to the second floor and noticed five or six totally darkened windows, ‘Ah,” he said, ‘I see they’re working late.'”