So I had an evening when time was hanging heavily on my hands, so I turned to that incredible piece of technology we euphemistically call a phone, but is actually more aptly described as a hand-held computer. I went to the YouTube© site and started by looking for the best John Wayne scenes from his movies. At one point, I happened across a piece of video taken from one of Don Rickle's many forays into network television (all unsuccessful, as it turned out). Rickles was hosting a variety show and one of his guests was The Duke. Well, as these searches sometimes go, that turned into a lot of video from Rickles' career. But while he was a superstar on the stage circuit (he was huge in Vegas), I think so much of his best work came from his interaction with the legendary late night talk show host Johnny Carson.
I pretty much grew up watching Carson. His monologues with which he opened his show were fabulous, and even when he had a joke that went flat, he had a way of rescuing the moment in a way that was incredibly funny. Carson had a universal appeal that went beyond the glitz and glamor of Hollywood and New York. A big part of that was his roots. He was a Midwesterner, born and bred in Nebraska, and even in the presence of such legends as Jack Benny, Frank Sinatra, and Dean Martin (I'm undoubtedly dating myself here), he struck the perfect balance between folksy and sophisticated. Even after he finally retired, the affection of his audience never faded. On one occasion, just a few months before his death, he was invited on the Letterman show to do a Top Ten list. He came out on stage, and the audience erupted in cheers, standing in tribute. The adulation went on so long that Carson abandoned the bit and eventually left the stage, I suspect moved to tears by the crowd's obvious affection. In the years since, there have been successors and wanna-be's, but in the minds of those who watched him all those years, there was only on Johnny Carson. And there'll never be another.
Anyway, as I began to scroll through the videos of Carson's unquestioned reign, I came upon one compilation that covered just about every appearance Don Rickles appeared on The Tonight Show during the decade of the 1970's. Rickles was known as primarily an insult comic, that is, getting his laughs through apparently putting down other people, even Carson himself. But those who knew Rickles privately were unanimous in their assessment that offstage, Don Rickles was a humble and gentle man, who treated people with unquestioned warmth and dignity. The schtick of insult was merely for the stage. The end result of his act was a kind of mad hilarity. Watching those snippets, I was transported back in time to a different era, where we were not nearly as obsessively sensitive about what people were saying. We still had the ability to laugh at ourselves, especially laughing at comedians laughing at us. The compilation lasted over an hour, and before it was even a quarter over, I had laughed myself into tears and rib pain. It felt wonderful. I hadn't laughed that long or hard at anything for...well, longer than I could remember. I felt something shake loose inside me and fall away, that dark shroud over my spirit put there by the events of the past year or so.
Now, I know that Don Rickles is, at least by today's standards, very much an acquired taste. And if you weren't around during that time, it probably won't mean anything to you. But his humor was never meant to be taken seriously or personally, and everyone knew it, especially his friends (very much including Carson) of which he had legions.
The thing is, through re-watching those episodes, I managed to find my laugh, something that's been missing for awhile. Part of that, I know, is re-living an earlier time, one that seems so quaintly simpler, even though the '70's were far from simple. But I was young, my story as yet unwritten. All the possibilities were still there. Maybe that's what I miss.
Nevertheless, it felt good to laugh out loud, without reservation or self-consciousness.
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