Insights into comics
By Jim Windolf |
January 31, 2010, Sunday
|
Print Edition
Print Edition
TWO new books center on the collision between comedy and the old establishment. "Last Words," a posthumous autobiography from George Carlin, is a jazzy, inward-looking piece of work. Its strength lies in its documentation of how this great comedian made the trip from a happy-to-be-here entertainer of the 1960s to the salt-in-the-wound -philosopher-comic of the 1970s and beyond.
"Dangerously Funny: The Uncensored Story of 'The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour'," by veteran television critic David Bianculli, is a straightforward chronicle that charts the rise and fall of a charming double act cut down in its prime by annoyed CBS executives.
When Carlin appeared on "The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour" during its 1968-69 season, he was in a rut and he knew it. As he notes in "Last Words," the program was "the only comedy show that was actually taking a stand against the war," but he ignored the chance it gave him to do something daring. At the time, he was locked inside the good-boy phase of his career.
There he stood, on the CBS stage, dressed in a crisp blue suit, hair neatly parted, as he launched into his much practiced "Indian Sergeant" bit. It was not bad. In fact, it was not far from the smoothly professional routines that Jerry Seinfeld and other observational comics would later deliver. But it lacked the obsessive hacking away at unpleasant topics that would characterize the best Carlin material.
He was blessed or else just overloaded with opinions on subjects ranging from the ridiculous (bellybutton lint) to the sublime (the existence of God). As "Last Words" confirms, he had the verbal dexterity to convey his skewed thinking in rants that entertained his fans and took aim at nearly everyone else. He really was impressive.
In the third act of his career, starting in the late 1970s, he put together 14 HBO specials featuring ambitious, painstakingly worded long-form routines. Furthermore, his late-period work, which included the gleeful "I Kinda Like It When a Lot of People Die," was just as angry and relevant as anything he had come up with when he made his classic albums in the early 1970s.
"Last Words" has been assembled by its co-author, Tony Hendra, from his many hours of interviews with the book's hero-narrator, as well as from autobiographical material left behind by Carlin. It is a treasure for anyone who has ever felt in tune with this cheerfully misanthropic comedian.
Although it sometimes skimps on detail, the book is very strong when it goes into Carlin's analyses of how he learned to speak his mind onstage and also of how he took timid backward steps following many of his eureka moments.
Never moaned
The Smothers Brothers are unlike Carlin in that they have never moaned, hectored or ranted from the stage. Still on the road today, they have relied on the nicely vaudevillian interplay between Dick's strait-laced straight man and the mischievous innocent played by Tom. Bianculli's thorough history of the duo comes at a perfect time, because the circumstances that made them an important part of American pop culture are largely gone.
As the author makes clear, Tom and Dick had a big impact partly because they hit their stride back when the variety format was still viable, and the act of communing nightly with network TV was a major national activity. After having failed to put up any real competition against "Bonanza," a longstanding NBC ratings leader, CBS got lucky in 1967 when it gave a prize prime-time slot to these bickering, folk-singing brothers.
Although their act was welcoming and lighthearted, Tom and Dick, accidental rebels, proved more and more representative of the postwar generation as they moved toward their third and final season. Most of "Dangerously Funny" is easygoing and informative, with Bianculli serving as a friendly but authoritative guide.
Carlin and the Smothers Brothers have a presence these days on YouTube, and Carlin holds up especially well in his digital surroundings. "Last Words" is an extension of his plain-spoken oeuvre. The "Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour" clips now available online, by contrast, seem more like historical curiosities. Tom and Dick did their best stuff in a context all but gone.
"Dangerously Funny: The Uncensored Story of 'The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour'," by veteran television critic David Bianculli, is a straightforward chronicle that charts the rise and fall of a charming double act cut down in its prime by annoyed CBS executives.
When Carlin appeared on "The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour" during its 1968-69 season, he was in a rut and he knew it. As he notes in "Last Words," the program was "the only comedy show that was actually taking a stand against the war," but he ignored the chance it gave him to do something daring. At the time, he was locked inside the good-boy phase of his career.
There he stood, on the CBS stage, dressed in a crisp blue suit, hair neatly parted, as he launched into his much practiced "Indian Sergeant" bit. It was not bad. In fact, it was not far from the smoothly professional routines that Jerry Seinfeld and other observational comics would later deliver. But it lacked the obsessive hacking away at unpleasant topics that would characterize the best Carlin material.
He was blessed or else just overloaded with opinions on subjects ranging from the ridiculous (bellybutton lint) to the sublime (the existence of God). As "Last Words" confirms, he had the verbal dexterity to convey his skewed thinking in rants that entertained his fans and took aim at nearly everyone else. He really was impressive.
In the third act of his career, starting in the late 1970s, he put together 14 HBO specials featuring ambitious, painstakingly worded long-form routines. Furthermore, his late-period work, which included the gleeful "I Kinda Like It When a Lot of People Die," was just as angry and relevant as anything he had come up with when he made his classic albums in the early 1970s.
"Last Words" has been assembled by its co-author, Tony Hendra, from his many hours of interviews with the book's hero-narrator, as well as from autobiographical material left behind by Carlin. It is a treasure for anyone who has ever felt in tune with this cheerfully misanthropic comedian.
Although it sometimes skimps on detail, the book is very strong when it goes into Carlin's analyses of how he learned to speak his mind onstage and also of how he took timid backward steps following many of his eureka moments.
Never moaned
The Smothers Brothers are unlike Carlin in that they have never moaned, hectored or ranted from the stage. Still on the road today, they have relied on the nicely vaudevillian interplay between Dick's strait-laced straight man and the mischievous innocent played by Tom. Bianculli's thorough history of the duo comes at a perfect time, because the circumstances that made them an important part of American pop culture are largely gone.
As the author makes clear, Tom and Dick had a big impact partly because they hit their stride back when the variety format was still viable, and the act of communing nightly with network TV was a major national activity. After having failed to put up any real competition against "Bonanza," a longstanding NBC ratings leader, CBS got lucky in 1967 when it gave a prize prime-time slot to these bickering, folk-singing brothers.
Although their act was welcoming and lighthearted, Tom and Dick, accidental rebels, proved more and more representative of the postwar generation as they moved toward their third and final season. Most of "Dangerously Funny" is easygoing and informative, with Bianculli serving as a friendly but authoritative guide.
Carlin and the Smothers Brothers have a presence these days on YouTube, and Carlin holds up especially well in his digital surroundings. "Last Words" is an extension of his plain-spoken oeuvre. The "Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour" clips now available online, by contrast, seem more like historical curiosities. Tom and Dick did their best stuff in a context all but gone.
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