Ah, damn. When hubby woke me up to tell me the news this morning, I went kinda numb, blessed by the fog of sleep that still lingered. Opened up the web, and read the article to get the details, and the numbness turned to profound sadness. Next step, of course, was the Dope, as I already knew there’d be a lengthy thread forming, and there exists comfort in sharing your pain with others. I was okay until I read Marley’s bit about barely holding it together. So then I cried, as I read the rest of the replies.
But this
tore my heart out completely. George Carlin is one of my favorite people, just because he seems so real. With him, it never felt like I was watching an act; he just stood on stage and was himself, the same him you’d see if you bumped into him on the street.
I can’t really say anymore right now. Fuck.
ETA: the quote hurt because it’s perfect, George woulda loved it, and it sums it up nicely.
By any chance did George Carlin write for Deadwood? Because if you put “the seven words” to the tune of God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen you basically have an Al Swearengen Christmas Carol.
It’s hard to believe Carlin was once partnered with Jack Burns (who later was with Avery Schreiber). That’s about like imagining Kurt Cobain as a singing duo with Harry Connick, Jr…
I remember when I was in high school he was booed offstage in Alabama when he gave a performance at Troy State University. (TSU is a large college in Troy, a small city about 40 miles south of Montgomery, that has some good and some “eh” programs but is mainly known for having branches all over the world and being the college for people who can’t go to Auburn or U. of AL- it has a lot of working and non-trad students and is very conservative for a college town.) I can’t remember what he said, but some of the audience deemed it offensive and I remember the word “unAmerican” being kicked around, but he responded with an extremely embarassed apology, apology here meaning something to the effect of “Oh fuck you, you bunch of thin skinned redneck morons” and launching into an “if that offended you, this is gonna make you clutch your chest and fall dead” routine before leaving the stage because he couldn’t be heard. Of course to me and to others my age (16-ish) who had our own problems with the redneck mentality this made him a hero, but I’ve always wondered exactly what he said and if this was the only time (after becoming an icon) that he was ever jeered offstage.
Yeah, well, I got choked up a few times during the morning and came within a hair’s breadth of crying outright when Diogenes posted the Seven Words You Can’t Say. Imagine having to explain to your editor that you’re crying because some guy wrote some curse words on the Internet.
I wanted to say this about Carlin, also: while he was very, very good with words, he was a working class, regular-guy comedian, which it seems to me has become rare in standup. He was by and large a regular New York guy of his time, or at least he came across that way.
Also rare, not to say completely impossible to duplicate: modern standup (meaning topical, non-Henny Youngman-style jokes) began with Mort Sahl and Lenny Bruce, I guess, in the late 50s or early 60s. Carlin started getting popular in the late '60s and developed his own style almost 40 years ago. There’s been George Carlin almost as long as there has been standup comedy.
I saw him here in Gainesville (jeez, over ten years ago already!) and when he did his bit about the invisible man in the sky who watches you and tells you what to do, I thought the audience response was a bit more subdued.
He also did a great routine comparing religion to high heels. The point was (paraphrasing) “if they make you feel taller or just better about yourself that’s great, but don’t insist everyone else learn to walk in them and for God’s sake don’t go to some fucked up Third World country where they’ve already got enough problems and try to make the natives wear them”.
“I met you at a party, about 4-6 weeks ago, and you said I was a real good sport? …And now I’m going to jump out the window!”
“Say–you ARE a good sport, aren’t you!”
He will be missed. He was my first introduction to stand up. There are very few comedians I respect as performers (and people)–he makes that short list.
God speed, Mr Conductor. (my kids only know him via Thomas the Tank)
God: Oh, by the way, if you don’t mind…we’ve got the camera and the microphones and the desk all ready. Tim Russert is waiting to interview you.
I remember watching George on video when I was pregnant. It might have been hormones, but I just fell on the floor and I couldn’t breathe, I was laughing so hard. “Walk up to someone, get in their face, and scream I HAVE NOTHING TO SAY!”
I have one of his albums, made (I think) in 2000, with a bit – a really funny bit – about how there’s too much airport security. I wonder if he felt embarrassed over that after 9/11. In any case, his next album had a patriotic – specifically a New York patriotic tone – and a bit about sending the Flatulent Airborne Reaction Team into Afghanistan to smoke bin Laden out of the caves. Good save.
If he ever did a bit about Iraq, I never heard it.
No way. For one thing, those stupid procedures didn’t stop September 11th, and for another, the bit in question is hilarious. But there IS a bit I wonder if he felt bad about later. It was called “I Kinda Like It When a Lot of People Die,” in which he imagined a really big series of disasters in one day, like plane crashes and the Vice President getting shot and some other things. I don’t remember the specifics, but September 11 came fairly close. He dropped the bit from his routine, I think and the HBO special that was going to be given that title was called “Complaints and Grievances,” and he obviously made up some new material for it. It was recorded in November 2001. The big about people dying was in Napalm and Silly Putty, since that had already been published.
