Word: standup
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...youth, Merkin is tempted by the Devil (Milton Berle). From then on, girls fall in line beside his bed. From time to time Merkin is visited by Death (George Jessel) who gazes at Merkin with basilisk eyes and bleats standup jokes that are as dead as vaudeville. Eventually, even he sighs, "I think I should warn you I'm getting new material...
Cinema verite is one of those flexible French phrases, like piece de resistance; it covers a multitude of meanings. Back in the early '60s, the technique was its own justification, as film makers with new lightweight sound cameras trailed anyone from condemned convicts to standup comics. The idea was to produce a picture as exciting as drama but as honest as a snapshot. Now that methods and audiences are more sophisticated, pure documentary footage is no longer enough. As two new and wildly different cinema verite movies suggest, it is necessary to do more than merely capture reality...
PORTNOY himself calls it "The Alexander Portnoy Show!" He's the standup comedian out to tell the definitive Jewish joke. He is also the talented son, risen to the post of Assistant Commissioner for the City of New York Commission on Human Opportunity. His parents--"the two outstanding producers and packagers of guilt in our time"--are the expected, overprotective Jewish mother and her long-suffering, constipated husband (whose constipation seems to rival Luther's in cosmic significance.) Togther they praise and badger Portnoy until he finds himself in a paradoxical position: his family considers him among "princes . . . and saviours...
...says Lucille Ball. Adds Joey Bishop: "I'd like to get the applause at the end of my show that he gets before he opens his mouth." Woody Allen, himself a gag writer as well as performer, says: "He has been a terrific influence on every standup, one-line monologist. The thing which makes him great just can't be stolen or imitated." Jack Benny, Hope's warmest admirer, says: "It's not enough just to get laughs. The audience has to love you, and Bob gets love as well as laughs from his audiences...
...notice a simpering girl, the smile of a dragon eager to rip his guts out fascinated him. That was perfect. So was the way he dipped cigars in his wine glass and wound a noisy watch during the musical interlude. But Scott abandoned his role occasionally to play standup comedian. He would execute a clever turn but spoil it by acting as if he thought it was pretty clever...