Stripslashes function in PHP? Doesn't seem to work...

Question

I've been trying to get the stripslashes() function in a PHP script to work but I'm not having any luck.  It seems like a very straightforward function but I'm still ending up with slashes in my comment/text area data.  Can anyone help?  I have some PHP books but they barely touch on the functionality.  (I'm new to PHP).  Thanks!  (BTW...  I removed the various attempts at calling the stripslashes() function).  The field I'm trying to remove the slashes from is the 'comment' variable.
Here is my short php script:
<?php // Script 1.0 - contactlist.php
if (isset($_POST['submit']) && !empty($_POST['submit'])) // Test if submit button named submit was clicked and not empty
          if (!empty($_POST['first']) && !empty($_POST['last'])  && !empty($_POST['email']) && !empty($_POST['phone']) && !empty($_POST['comment'])) {
                    $body = "First Name: {$_POST['first']}\nLast Name: {$_POST['last']}\nEmail Address: {$_POST['email']}\nContact Phone Number: {$_POST['phone']}\nContact Preference: {$_POST['contactvia']}\n\nBest Time To Contact: {$_POST['timepref']}\n\nComments:\n {$_POST['comment']}";
                    $body = wordwrap($body, 70);
                    mail('[email protected]', 'NEW Customer Inquiry Submission',$body, "From: {$_POST['email']}");
                    header('Location: index.html');  //Redirect to new url if form submitted
?>

Answer 1

I agree with you about the host not being able to install (or at least don't want to install/upgrade) their servers to php5.4...  Unfortunately, I can't change that...  but by shutting them off took care of all the quotes (single & double) and any other characters which would basically function like an addslashes() command.  I'll paste the script below...  It's still pretty much the same as when you helped me out with the script...  Just minor adjustments:::  If you can show me (even though I fixed the problem) how I would integrate the stripslashes() function to the comment field it would be helpful to know for future reference.
<?php // Script 1.0 - contactlist.php
if (isset($_POST['submit']) && !empty($_POST['submit'])) // Test if submit button named submit was clicked and not empty
          if (!empty($_POST['first']) && !empty($_POST['last'])  && !empty($_POST['email']) && !empty($_POST['phone']) && !empty($_POST['comment'])) {
$comment=stripslashes($_POST[comment]);
                    $body = "First Name: {$_POST['first']}\nLast Name: {$_POST['last']}\nEmail Address: {$_POST['email']}\nContact Phone Number: {$_POST['phone']}\nContact Preference: {$_POST['contactvia']}\n\nBest Time To Contact: {$_POST['timepref']}\n\nComments:\n {$_POST['comment']}";
                    $body = wordwrap($body, 70);
                    mail([email protected]', 'NEW Customer Inquiry Submission',$body, "From: {$_POST['email']}");
                    header('Location: index.html');  //Redirect to new url if form submitted
?>