Airplane! and Naked Gun writer-director Jim Abrahams dead at 80

Jim Abrahams, the writer-director who helped create comedy classics such as “Airplane!,” the “Naked Gun” movies, and the TV series “Police Squad!” has died.He was 80.Abrahams passed away of natural causes on Tuesday at his home in Santa Monica, Calif., his son Joseph Abrahams told The Hollywood Reporter.

Together with his boyhood friends Jerry and David Zucker, Abrahams ushered in a new wave of zany Hollywood comedies beginning with 1977’s sketch-comedy “Kentucky Fried Movie,” directed by John Landis, before he helmed “Animal House.” One of their most popular films, “Airplane!” — on which all three shared writing and directing credits — hit theaters in 1980.The trio — aka, “ZAZ,” Zucker-Abrahams-Zucker — would continue to work together throughout the 1980s, partnering for “Top Secret!” (1984), “Ruthless People” (1986) and the “Top Gun” sendups “Hot Shots!” and “Hot Shots! Part Deux.”Working in the same vein as comedy legend Mel Brooks, Abrahams and the Zucker brothers had a knack for combining absurd situations with deadpan writing.

They also spurred Leslie Nielsen’s rise to fame.The actor had been working in TV and film for three decades and became the most unlikely of Hollywood leading men.The Post has reached out to a rep for Abrahams.This is a developing story....