Word: carneys
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...about; the plot serves as its stage, and they walk all over it. The characters of Oscar and Nicky have been pieced together with bits not only from Laurel and Hardy, the first two-man comedy act, but from all of their successors: Hope and Cresby, Abbott and Costello, Carney and Gleason, and Nichols's own broad way pair, the Odd Couple. All of these teams run on the same fuel--the big, ponderous straight-man who masterminds the operation always blowing up at the little dumb one, who muffs everything but stumbles on brilliant ideas through...
...last scene, where he's dying, I just looked at him lying there in his cage and I was really sad and shaken." Tonto amiably accepted Art's conversation, modeled on his uncle's chats with his dog. "I never thought it strange," explains Carney. "It was natural for someone living alone. My uncle would get up from his chair, walk into the next room, and share a thought with...
...Each Carney performance is full of such remembered observations. One of six sons of a newspaperman, Art grew up in a New York City suburb, perfecting a talent for mimicry. His first gig was imitating F.D.R. in comedy bits for the Horace Heidt band. "It was pure dynamite," he recalls. His skill won him a job in radio. "Acting on the radio gave me my first experience in a lot of different character parts. It was the only training I ever had." After war service and bit parts on television, Carney was picked to play Jackie Gleason's sidekick...
Second Banana. His success onstage coincided with failure off. He was drinking heavily. In 1965 he and his first wife were divorced. Recalls Carney: "I was at the point where I needed a shot of Scotch the minute I opened my eyes in the morning." It took Alcoholics Anonymous, treatment with Antabuse and his happy second marriage a few years later to pull him out. He has been on the wagon for a year with only occasional backsliding. "You don't lick all your problems," says Art, "but I've got most of mine under control...
...money and having new options. In his Beverly Hills hotel, his phone never stops ringing. He takes a call from Gleason. "What did you do last night?" "I went to see Chinatown," jokes Art. Then he smiles. His days of being anyone's second banana are over. Art Carney is a bankable actor...