Martin Nadler, acclaimed comedy writer, producer and actor who made the Vineyard laugh for decades, died at his home in Florida on August 26 of myasthenia gravis. He was 80 years old.

Marty to his friends and family, “the mayor of Oak Bluffs” to the Vineyard and “tourist man” to the set of Pretty Woman, Mr. Nadler’s jokes delighted on both coasts. He worked as a producer and writer for Laverne & Shirley, Happy Days and The Odd Couple, and wrote jokes for half a dozen movies as a script doctor including Runaway Bride and The Princess Diaries, where he had bit parts.

On the Vineyard he was known for his kindness and his unexpected and hilarious way of looking at things.

“He was show business personified,” said Larry Mollin, film producer and writer, and Mr. Nadler’s longtime friend. “He knew how to entertain.”

Mr. Nadler was born in the Bronx in 1945 and spent 14 summers at a summer camp in Monticello, N.Y., where he began to develop his comical sensibilities.

“My dad would tell these funny stories about how the rich kids would try to one up each other by saying how many bedrooms are in their house,” his son Charlie Nadler said. “They’d say, ‘I have five bedrooms in my house,’ and the next kid would say, ‘I have eight bedrooms in my house,’ and then they’d say, ‘Marty, what about you?’”

“And he’d be like, ‘Well, it’s an apartment building. There’s 1,500 units. We’ve got like 3,000 rooms in there,’” Charlie said.

Ever the class clown, Mr. Nadler discovered theatre early on, participating in school plays. At eight years old, he decided he wanted to go into showbiz. He began his standup at high school talent shows, repeating Woody Allen’s material onstage while he was finding his own voice. When playfully accused of the theft, he would pretend to be offended, his son said.

Mr. Nadler attended Ithaca College, where he studied drama and met Jeffrey Kramer, who played Deputy Hendricks in Jaws and was a member of the Cronig family. In 1966 and 1967, along with Mr. Mollin and others, the young men came to the Vineyard as the Vineyard Players, a summer stock theatre. They rented a house and bunked together, grabbing Giordano’s slices for 10 cents and getting into trouble.

“That first summer was the best summer of my life. I never looked back,” Mr. Nadler told the Gazette in 2018. “The Vineyard holds a special place in my heart.”

After college, Mr. Nadler moved to New York City and performed at The Improvisation in Hell’s Kitchen.

“It was a very classic time for comedy,” said Charlie Nadler. Marty “famously” sold all of his jokes to his friends to make a living, and began to transition to writing.

When Gary Marshall read a sample script of Mr. Nadler’s, the two began to collaborate, with Mr. Nadler writing and producing on many of Mr. Marshall’s sitcoms.

“He was the bravest one to go to the West Coast. It was unheard of, really. We were New York people, you know?” said Mr. Mollin, who soon followed Mr. Nadler to L.A. to start a career in show business. “I never would have done that if Marty hadn’t been there. He blazed the path for all of us.”

In 1976, an eager young screenwriter met with Mr. Nadler to pitch him story ideas for Laverne & Shirley. Mr. Nadler listened to her 45 pitches (a typical meeting covers four), then gave her an assignment and a month to write the script.

It was only after she turned in the script that Mr. Nadler asked her out, and soon afterwards, Holly and Marty Nadler were married on the banks of Seth’s Pond. The couple purchased a house on East Chop and raised their son on the Vineyard.

On the Island, he worked at the Old Stone Bakery, now Backdoor Donuts, the Chilmark General Store, and as a substitute teacher at the Oak Bluffs school. He also continued to work on films into the 2010s, and moved to Florida full time in 2011. He missed the Vineyard, he told the Gazette in 2018, but not the winters.

“Living on the Vineyard is a piece of cake until New Year’s Day,” he said at the time. “After New Year’s Day the government should send helicopters to get everyone off for their mental health.”

In his later years, Mr. Nadler wrote short stories, plays and memoirs, and continued to do summer stand-up shows on the Island. Charlie and Marty began sharing the stage a few years ago, bundling jokes, riffing off of each other, and writing together about their generational differences. Their upcoming special, A Boomer and a Millennial Walk into a Special, was filmed in L.A. last October, and will be released on audio streaming platforms in early 2027, according to Charlie Nadler. It was the last time the pair performed together.

“He was the kind of dad where he couldn’t change a tire on a car, but he could tell me how to structure a joke,” Charlie said.

Holly and Marty Nadler remained close friends after their divorce in 2002. He was sweet and supportive right up until he died, said Holly Nadler.

“People talk about in the same breath, not just how funny he was, but how kind he was,” she said.

The Nadler family is planning a memorial service at the Hebrew Center in October.