I know that I watched it regularly when it was on the air (it being a comedy, and me being 11 years old). I don’t really remember it well, other than the mental image of Rickles and his assistant (a tall, dorky blonde Southern guy).
Other than clips of Carson interrupting filming of that show (as Mahaloth mentions), I don’t think I’ve seen Sharkey since it was on the air. Given that it looks like a lot of the humor was based on Sharkey’s insults directed towards his ethnically-diverse recruits, I suspect that it hasn’t aged well at all.
“ Don Rickles joke: "Frank Sinatra saved my life once. Two hoods were beating me up in an alley. Frank walked by and said “okay boys, he’s had enough.” ”
My favorite line of his was from Toy Story, when the toys are listening in to the birthday party gifts being opened.
“Bed sheets?! Who invited THAT kid?!”
And there was a nice moment in one of the Toy Story movies when Don’s character is talking to another, off-camera character, and calling him a “hockey puck”–and of course it WAS a hockey puck.
Bob Newhart must be devastated. (They were very close, play-golf-everyday friends.)
I always enjoyed Don Rickles. Very funny guy, still quick-witted to the end. If he was still alive he could still make audiences roar with laughter, even at 90. RIP, Don, you will be missed.
A wonderful and kind man. He was the best friend of Bob Newhart. The two couples vacationed together. He had a unique style and it will be fifty years until someone can fill his shoes.
Too late to edit, I suppose. My favorite Rickles joke.
"So anyway before I met my wife I was dating a young lady in Vegas. Frank Sinatra was having dinner. She said ‘Oh, I’ would love to meet Sinatra.’ Well, I am in the business, I am allowed to talk to Sinatra so I go over. I say ‘Frank, I’m with this girl, she wants to meet you.’ He says he’ll come over in a few minutes. So I go back to my table.
“Frank gets up to use the restroom. On his way back, he stops at my table and makes a big deal of saying hello. I say to him, 'Damn it Frank, can’t you see I’m with somebody?”
I remember REALLY liking him when I was a wee pup. Didn’t really understand why other people said he was “mean.” Now, decades later, I wonder how much my cynical nature attracted me to him, or whether his comedy influenced my personality/sense of humor…
I liked his standup, but remember him more from guest spots on Dean Martin’s show and on Carson, as well as several parts on 1960s sitcoms. He appeared on a few episodes of Get Smart, and there are blooper reels of the two Dons cracking each other up so many times that it’s amazing they ever finished the scene.
He played a holdup man who sticks up Rob and Laura Petrie in an elevator (that gets stuck between floors) on The Dick van Dyke Show – a hilarious episode.
Rob: The gun in your pocket was a comb? You don’t even NEED a comb!
Rickles: You sure know how to hurt a guy, Rob.
I recall CPO Sharkey, but never watched it.
The first image of Rickles that came to mind was of him coughing aboard the sub in “Run Silent, Run Deep” and looking abashed because the Japanese patrolling overhead might have heard.
