(finds thread in a search for ‘dry wit’, reads same, enjoys enormously, apologizes for reanimating yon stiff)
You really can’t have a ‘dry wit’ retrospective without examples from the late John Florence Sullivan, aka Fred Allen:
-Hanging is too good for a man who makes puns; he should be drawn and quoted.
-California is a great place to live if you’re an orange.
-Imitation is the sincerest form of television.
-You can take all the sincerity in Hollywood, place it in the navel of a fruit fly and still have room enough for three caraway seeds and a producer’s heart.
I wonder about this, but it is often quoted. On the other hand, Jean Harlow’s shtick was the kind of ditzy blonde who gets put down (special award to Marie Dressler for the stagiest double-take):
This I do doubt, at least in those words (neither would ever have said “Hi” - Ernest Thesiger was famously grandly camp in manner, and for summing up his experiences in the trenches in World War I as “My dear, the noise! The people!”)/ However, there is a tale of (I think) Sir Thomas Beecham, the conductor, getting into a lift somewhere rather grand, and realising that he had seen the rather distinguished-looking lady beside him somewhere before, but couldn’t remember the name, only that she had a brother.
Beecham: “Good morning. How are you, and, er, how is your brother - still… erm,…?”
Lady: “He’s very well thank you. And still the King.”
And there’s another one about Beecham’s great contemporary and sometimes antagonist, Sir Malcolm Sargent, a terrible snob and namedropper, who welcomed a somewhat overawed friend to one of his after-concert parties with “I must introduce you!”, and took him towards a tall man standing quietly in one corner:
“Your Majesty, may I present my friend, Mr…” and then in a stage whisper to the friend “It’s the King of Denmark!”
There was a cough and the quiet man said “Excuse me… Norway.”
Re the Which Tyler saga: I have a fondness for the other “Pedants’ Revolt” joke.
The King rides out to try to negotiate with the rebels. Getting to the spot where they’re congregated, he exclaims: “Bless my soul ! You people are numerous – I’d have imagined there’d be less of you.”
At which the whole crowd yells, as though with one voice: “FEWER !”
Maybe not a perfect example, but in Sam Donaldson’s Playboy magazine interview, he stated that he had this brief Q&A with Ronald Reagan:
Sam Donaldson: “Mr President, did you hear about the survey of what men do in the shower?”
Reagan: No.
Donaldson: Well, they found that 90 percent of men sing in the shower and the other 10 percent play with themselves. Amazingly, they all sing the same song. Do you know what they sing?
My daughter is good at it. For example, my wife was helping her fill out a medical form. She’d ask my daughter the questions and then write down her answers.
I can’t recall the musician who was savaged by a reviewer, and who replied, “I am sitting in the smallest room in my house. I have your review before me. Soon I will have it behind me.”
Dry wit is always delivered in a deadpan way. No expectant looks at the audience to see if they got it. No guffaws. No repeating the punchline.
Are there any current comedians famous for their dry wit? A Dutch example would be Herman Finkers.
A visiting line of nervous thrilled people was being introduced to the Queen of England recently. Right when a man was introduced to Her Majesty, and shook her hand, his cellphone started ringing in his pocket. Elisabeth drily said: "You’d better get that. It might be someone important. ".
And when asked whether he had ever played (ultra-abstract modernist composer) Stockhausen’s music, Beecham replied “No, but I have stepped in some”.
Then, there’s Satie who approached Debussy after a performance of the latter’s La Mer (the first movement of which is titled From Dawn to Noon on the Sea) and exclaimed: “I particularly enjoyed the part at a quarter past eleven”.
Finally, and variously attributed to either Stravinsky or Dallapiccola: “**Vivaldi **has not composed 500 concertos, but the same concerto 500 times”.
This is one I read about Voltaire in his deathbed. The priest in attendance urged him to renounce Satan, and Voltaire is said to have replied: “Now, now, my good father; this is not the moment to make enemies…”
I knew I should have read the whole thread before posting…
OK, then I have a different one! Also last words, also with a priest in attendance.
General Narváez, who was several times prime minister under Isabel II, queen of Spain, in the mid-19th century. He had a rather grim reputation, obtained during the Carlist civil wars that shook Spain throughout the 19th century.
In 1868 he was dying, and the priest tending to him asked him if he had forgiven his enemies. Narváez replied: “I do not have any enemies. I had all of them shot.”