in the 1969 all-star Broadway revival of Three Men On A Horse directed by George Abbott, the original Broadway director and co-author which was preceded by a national tour Levene directed, starring Levene as Patsy and Bert Parks as Erwin. In a 1969 review of the all star Broadway revival of Three Men on a Horse, The New York Times theatre critic Clive Barnes wrote "Sam Levene originated the role of Patsy in 1935—by now it’s his. Still looking like a man whose eyes have been allocated the wrong size eyelids, still mugging, double taking, offering his celebrated impersonation of an actor impersonating a character that would based himself on Damon Runyon, Mr. Levene is great. No one in the world plays Mr. Levene as he does, And what’s more, no one ever will". After making his Broadway debut 43 years earlier, Levene made his Off-Broadway debut, starring in Irv Bauer's A Dream Out of Time at the Promenade Theatre, Levene's only Off-Broadway appearance. In 1976, Levene was cast as Tubal, Shylock's business partner, in the Broadway production of The Merchant based on an adaptation of The Merchant of Venice but withdrew from the Philadelphia tryout after Zero Mostel, the play's star and Levene's lifelong dear friend died after first collapsing in his dressing room; Levene observed, "I was too close to Zero and a play we both loved, to do it without him." When John Dexter, the director, asked Levene if he would continue in the show, Levene told Dexter, "We just had one death; we don't need two." Understudy Joseph Leon replaced Zero Mostel for the Broadway production of The Merchant which closed November 19, 1977, after five performances. Levene's final Broadway credit was performing the starring role of Samuel Horowitz in the Broadway comedy Horowitz and Mrs. Washington (1980) co-starring Esther Rolle, directed by Joshua Logan. In 1980, Levene starred in a summer stock and national tour of Horowitz and Mrs. Washington co-starring Claudia McNeil. Film career Nine years after making his Broadway debut, Levene was lured and moved to Hollywood in 1936 when he made his motion picture debut as Patsy in the Warner Bros. film Three Men on a Horse (1936) directed and produced by Mervyn LeRoy. Levene earned $1,000 a week to recreate on film his comedic Broadway role as Patsy he had played for seventy weeks in the original Broadway production of Three