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Tom Sobel is an American talent agent specializing in stand-up comedy. During the comedy boom of the 1980s, Sobel's Comedy Caravan was the main source for touring comedians in the US.

Shapiro graduated from New York University. He then went to work in the mail room at the William Morris Agency in New York. He advanced within the company and soon became an agent. One of his first assignments was to accompany Elvis Presley during his appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show. Eventually, he began packaging hit programs such as The Steve Allen Show, That Girl starring Marlo Thomas, and Gomer Pyle starring Jim Nabors. He also packaged a number of specials for Dick Van Dyke, Mary Tyler Moore and Carol Channing.

Shapiro later left William Morris to become a personal manager and producer along with his partner and friend, Howard West They formed Shapiro/West Productions and executive produced the Emmy, Peabody, and Golden Globe award winning series, Seinfeld. Shapiro was Andy Kaufman's personal manager for many years, executive producing the performer's special for Showtime entitled, Andy Kaufman at Carnegie Hall and one for ABC, The Andy Kaufman Show. He also was executive producer with Howard West on the Universal feature film Man on the Moon starring Jim Carrey in the role of Andy Kaufman and had a cameo in the movie as Mr. Besserman.

He was portrayed in the Kaufman biopic, Man on the Moon by Danny DeVito. He also played a prominent role in the documentary Comedian.

On June 30, 2012 The comedy world gathered at the Beverly Wilshire Hotel in Beverly Hills to honor George Shapiro. The David Lynch Foundation was thrilled to present him with the first Lifetime of Bliss Award. He says he’d been practicing the Transcendental Meditation technique (TM) for 28 years.