Fire at Will...iams

Someone needs to tell Robin Williams to calm the fuck down.

Seriously. We get it. You’re funny. Relax. You got the gig.

I was watching Mork on Sit Down Comedy with David Steinberg, a very cool show on TV-Land, wherein the veteran comedian interviews other comedians and talks about stand up, and influences, and all of the standard stuff associated with a show like this. I had seen an episode with Jerry Seinfeld, and enjoyed the easy going discursive nature of the interview. Jerry wasn’t just doing bits, but was talking about his life and what he finds funny. Very cool. (I used to love-LOVE L.O.V.E. the old show Later with Bob Costas. This was a 1:30 am show that used to air on NBC and was 30 minutes with a single guest. Bob once had Mel Brooks on for FOUR straight episodes, and it was just great. A superlative interviewer with top notch guests. THIS show reminded me of THAT show. Anyway…)

After watching the Seinfeld interview, I saw that the next guest was going to be ol’ Patch Adams himself, and I knew that it would suck. FIRST OFF- the show is normally 30 minutes, but for Cronauer it was going to be a special ONE HOUR edition. Fuck. I had watched Garp on Inside the Actors Studio, and that was a special TWO HOUR version that was…eh. The only reason it was remotely watchable was because Lipton is such a non-entity personality wise, that at least you didn’t feel that Mrs. Doubtfire was stepping all over the host.

On the Steinberg show, the host is a pretty accomplished comedian who has quite a pedigree. He never reached the iconic status of a Carlin or Pryor (or even Klein for that matter…) but still, he's been in the business for neigh 40 years. He's NOT some perfect-toothed douche from Entertainment This Sec or Hollywood Enema Report asking sub-austrolopithacine questions.

Well... the PERFECT example of how FUCKING ANNOYING Rainbow Randolph was- was during one point when the discussion got on the subject of the Marx brothers. After Armand Goldman does a mediocre Chico impression talking about Republicans (nerft) Steinberg starts telling a story that he used to WORK for Groucho Marx. Apparently he wrote the first draft of Minnie’s Boys (a stage play about the Marx brothers and their Mom) and during that time, every Tuesday he would go to Hillcrest country club and have lunch with Groucho, Jack Benny, and George Burns.

I’ll say that again.

HE WOULD HAVE LUNCH WITH GROUCHO, BENNY, AND BURNS.

Does Popeye shut the fuck up to hear maybe nine seconds of WHAT THAT MUST HAVE BEEN LIKE? No, he goes off and does a shitty Gracie impression, and then imagines what it would be like if his TV show had been called Mork & Ghandi.

Oh Robin… you’re such a GENIUS. Thank you for sharing your GIFT! Just HOW do you manage to come up with this stuff that you keep coming up with that is supposed to be off-the-cuff but is really the same three voices recycled into the same tired bits from 1986? Tell us- tell us!

Perhaps the MOST frustrating this was that about FOUR PERCENT of the time, Robin talks in a NORMAL voice, and what he says is REALLY INTERESTING. No- REALLY! He talked about going to Iraq and performing for the troops, and hearing a computer voice say “MISSILE DETECTED” when he was on a military plane (cool story).

Then he goes and RUINS it by doing a Pakistani cab driver impression. Sigh.

I’m still waiting for someone to interview him one day and tell him to just RELAX and TALK.

Interestingly enough, the best line of the show came from Steinberg, and not from Jakob the Liar. They were talking about how big Milton Berle’s dick is. (Is? Was? I dunno- a shcwantz like that probably doesn’t decompose… it just gets hung in a deli window… chikaboom…)

Anyway- David told a story about hosting a Roast for Berle, and that of ALL the “big dick” jokes, the best ‘big dick” joke came from comedian Dick Shawn. Apparently Dick said:

“I had a chance to see it- Milton was in the steam room at the Friar’s club, and I thought he was in there with his son.”

Brilliant.

At least Aladdin laughed and didn’t immediately “add” anything.

“Hoo... don’t be afraid…”

No. Be afraid.


By the way- These are the options my spell check gave for “schwantz”

shanty
swats
scants
chants
schwartz
secants
schmaltz
swat
shoats
swans
scanty