Billy Wilder's working slogan was "How Would Lubitsch Do It?"  He had the words inscribed on a sign by the legendary Saul Bass, who made an art form of title sequences.            

Ernest Lubitsch (1892-1947) for whom Wilder wrote (in collaboration of course because he never wrote alone) Bluebeard's Eight Wife (1938) and Ninotchka (1939) had a special way with comedy referred to as "the Lubitsch touch."  Wilder described the Lubitsch touch:  "It was the elegant use of the Superjoke.  You had a joke, and you felt satisfied, and then there was one more big joke on top of it.  The joke you didn't expect."

Lubitsch is to Wilder as Wilder is to several directors, such as Sam Mendes.  In his acceptance of the Oscar for his directorial debut, American Beauty (1999), Mendes acknowledged:  "...and finally I'd like to say thank you to a personal hero of mine who was a big influence on this movie.  I want to say thank you to Billy Wilder and I want to say to him, if my career after this amounts to one tenth of what yours has been, I will be a very happy man."      

In terms of screenwriting, Wilder's forte is the dialogue.  His dialogue propels his movies.  He would cut cost and speed up the introduction of the main character(s) with an opening narration.  He used voiceovers to string together the scenes.  Even when he avoided voiceover, he still used dialogue with a twist - a fly in The Spirit of St. Louis (1957), which is reminiscent of the unused cockroach speech in Hold Back the Dawn (1941).

His dialogue is very visual and well-anchored on something material.  Take for example the first meeting of the star and the screenwriter in Sunset Boulevard (1950) that is remembered for "I am big.  It's the pictures that got small."  The sequence has "popcorn, microphone, autograph album, hunk of cement for footprint" - words we associate with movies and movie stars.  Miss Desmond decries the de-silencing of  the movies as criminal and unsightly - "rope of words... strangled this business" and "the red, swollen tongue."  In Double Indemnity (1944), the most acclaimed dialogue sequence is "the speed limit" double entendre between the conspirators in their first meeting.  It's a very visual courtship dance and in their next meeting, the flirting gets visually domestic with "knit, wool and thumbs."

Wilder liked to run and run a line or motif, the so-called running gag but in Wilder's hands, a running gag worked smoothly and sounded  natural and unforced.  In The Apartment (1960), the "wise" motif  starts with Mr. Kirkeby's "manpower-wise, promotion-wise" promise to Mr. Baxter and ends with Miss Kubelik's making up her mind "that's the way it crumbles, cookie-wise."  In Some Like It Hot (1959), Joe improvises a blood type O routine with Jerry in front of Nellie and both have manage to keep it up together and separately.

Wilder also made a running gag out of an action during the dialogue.  The match lighting gag in Double Indemnity (1944) has Keyes always fumbling to find a match  to light the cigar that he wants to smoke  to punctuate an eloquent outburst.  As shrewd and capable as he is, just can't put together a cigar and match in the same scene without the assistance of Walter.  At the end of the movie, Keyes holds the match to light Walter's cigarette.  Wilder comes up with another match lighting gag in Stalag 17 (1953) between Sefton and the hot-tempered vigilante-minded Duke.  Sefton enjoys provoking Duke by striking a match on his body but at the third time he does it, the outcome is different.  The match lighting avoids a schmaltzy reconciliation between the two.

And speaking of schmaltz or excessive sentimentality, a Billy Wilder fan can depend on him not to go there.  Combine the avoidance of schmaltz and tendency toward cynicism and layers and layers of humor, and you get the perfect Billy Wilder movie.  

The movies from which the dialogue in A to Z are taken from: 

1.     Ninotchka (1939)
        Story by Melchior Lengyel.
        Screenplay by Billy Wilder, Charles Brackett and Walter Reisch. (Oscar nomination)
        Directed by Ernst Lubitsch.
2.     Ball of Fire (1941)
        Story by Billy Wilder and Thomas Monroe.
        Screenplay by Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett.
        Directed by Howard Hawks.
3.     The Major and the Minor (1942)
        Based on the play "Sunny Goes Home" by Fanny Kilbourne.
        Based on a play "Connie Goes Home" by Edwards Childs Carpenter.
        Screenplay by Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett.
        Directed by Billy Wilder.  (Directorial debut)
4.     Five Graves to Cairo (1943)
        Based on the play by Lajos Biró.
        Screenplay by Billy Wilder and Charles Brackett. 
        Directed by Billy Wilder.
5.     Double Indemnity (1944) (Best Picture nomination)
        Based on the novel "Double Indemnity in Three Kind" by James M. Cain.
        Screenplay by Billy Wilder and Raymond Chandler. (Oscar nomination)
        Directed by Billy Wilder. (Oscar nomination)
6.      Sunset Boulevard (1950) (Best Picture nomination)
         Screenplay by Billy Wilder, Charles Brackett and D. M. Marshman Jr. (Oscar winner)
         Directed by Billy Wilder. (Oscar nomination)
7.      Ace in the Hole (1951)
         Story by Victor Desny.
         Screenplay by Billy Wilder, Lesser Samuels and Walter Newman. (Oscar nomination)
         Directed by Billy Wilder.
8.      Stalag 17 (1953)
         Based on the play by Donald Bevan and Edmund Trzcinski.
         Screenplay by Billy Wilder and Edwin Blum.
         Directed by Billy Wilder. (Oscar nomination)
9.      Sabrina (1954)
         Based on the play "Sabrina Fair" by Samuel A. Taylor.
         Screenplay by Billy Wilder, Samuel A. Taylor and Ernest Lehman. (Oscar nomination)
         Directed by Billy Wilder. (Oscar nomination)
10.    The Seven Year Itch (1955)
         Based on the play "The Seven Year Itch" by George Axelrod.
         Screenplay by Billy Wilder and George Axelrod.
         Directed by Billy Wilder.
11.    Love in the Afternoon (1957)
         Based on the novel "Ariane, Jeune Fille Russe" by Claude Anet.
         Screenplay by Billy Wilder and I. A. L. Diamond.
         Directed by Billy Wilder.
12.    Witness for the Prosecution (1957) (Best Picture Oscar nomination)
         Based on the play by Agatha Christie.
         Adaptation by Larry Marcus.
         Screenplay by Billy Wilder and Harry Kurnitz.
         Directed by Billy Wilder (Oscar nomination)
13.    Some Like It Hot (1959)
         Story by Robert Thoeren and Michael Logan.
         Screenplay by Billy Wilder and I. A. L. Diamond. (Oscar Nomination)
         Directed by Billy Wilder.
14.    The Apartment (1960) (Best Picture Oscar)
         Screenplay by Billy Wilder and I. A. L. Diamond. (Oscar winner)
         Directed by Billy Wilder. (Oscar winner)
15.    One, Two, Three (1961)
         Based on the play "Egy, kettö, három" by Ferenc Molnar.
         Screenplay by Billy Wilder and I. A. L. Diamond.
         Directed by Billy Wilder.
16.    The Fortune Cookie (1966)
         Screenplay by Billy Wilder and I. A. L. Diamond. (Oscar nomination)
         Directed by Billy Wilder.