Especially since Sid was known as someone who was ‘difficult to work with’. Remember in the 1950’s he had his own shows where he was the boss and had a reputation for berating underlings, in part due to lack of sleep, pills and alcohol.
With a reputation like that, and not performing since the 1970’s, perhaps it’s no surprise that he wasn’t offered many roles, but I would have thought someone would have given him at least a few chances for walk-ons if in fact he wanted to do them. It sounds like he may have wanted to perform on some level, but really didn’t like the way TV was being made and would not have enjoyed the experience much.
It’s surprising to me that someone who was that famous and powerful in the 50’s and 60’s (remember that he was highest paid TV performer in 1954) could be so out of favor by the 1980’s. I wonder how many people who are under 30 years old have ever heard of him.
That may or may not be true. See, I’ve heard John Ratzenberger (who DID play Cliff on Cheers) claim that he came up with the idea for Cliff himself.
I have no inside info, I’m just passing along what I’ve heard Ratzenberger claim on a talk show. He says that he originally auditioned for the role of Norm… but that he knew George Wendt practically had the part sewn up. So, just as he was about to hear the standard “Thanks, we’ll be in touch” line from producer James L. Brooks, he thought fast and asked Brooks “Do you have a know-it-all?”
Brooks looked confused and asked, “A what?” Ratzenberger said, “Well, EVERY bar has to have a resident know-it-all.” He then gave his idea for a character who was always spouting off facts and trivia. Supposedly Brooks liked the idea, and added Cliff as a new character.
IF Ratzenberger is telling the truth.
(Or might Sid have been offered the role of Coach?)
I am not misremembering the claim in Caesar’s book that it was a Cheers role he summarily turned down but possibly it was the role of Coach … (and I’ve heard Ratzenberger’s assertion before)
Sid Caesar was the best and will always be remembered as the best. I didn’t even know about the drugs and alcohol till I read this thread.
Love doesn’t see the blemishes … Sid would probably just look old and silly instead of being good and silly like he was in the fifties, besides it was Imogene Coco and his other side kicks that made him funny.
Who could ever forget the “This is Your Life” comedy routine? Makes me smile remembering it
Teleprompters were in existence by the later years of his show. Looking around, I see Lucy and Desi were the first TV performers to use them, to read commercials on-camera from 1953. The year before, Eisenhower was the first presidential candidate to use one.
(Not saying Sid used one. You got me curious about teleprompters.)
I tend to believe Sid (he has no reason to lie) and since they were doing their shows from a theater, as opposed to a TV studio, the cameras appear to be relatively far away as to not block the audience’s view and so a teleprompter would have been a stretch.
Of course Sid says he didn’t use them because he didn’t want the actors to be glancing at it instead of knowing their lines. As I watch his older shows it’s clear they weren’t reading anything but reciting lines from rote memory.
Sorry I didn’t see this thread earlier, since this may be awkward…
As pointed out above the unavailablity of Sid’s work really hurt him in his attempted comeback in the 80s. Let’s not forget Sid’s biggest work predated 1954, when most Americans outside the Northeast still didn’t have a TV. And since “Your Show of Shows” rarely was syndicated, that meant most of the public really didn’t know who he was.
Plus does anyone know how picky Sid was about his acting offers? There’s very few jobs for older actors. Compare Sid’s availability to another TV pioneer, Milton Berle. Berle would appear for the opening of a can of spam if you paid him. Which means Berle was far more familiar to 80s TV viewers than Caeser was.
On the podcast that I mentioned earlier, Mel Brooks said that Caesar was offered plum roles in films and on Broadway back in the early 1950s. He was also dissatisfied with his show by then, and he was going to leave and pursue movies and nightclubs, several of his writers agreeing/begging to write his material, but he was offered a deal that he felt was just too lucrative for him to ignore and stayed on for another year.
By the time he did leave the show, his writers had moved on and his material was never as good again, and his substance abuse was worse and he was on the decline. He had some good moments after the 1950s, but was never a superstar again.
I saw this depressing article from Mark Evanier who got to know Caesar when he was a guest on the “Pink Lady and Jeff” show which Evanier was head writer. Evanier says Caesar tried to turn everything into a “Your Show of Shows” sketch. When a line called for him to mention Bo Derek (then the hottest sex symbol, Caesar changed it to Marilyn Monroe. Explaining Monroe was dead for two decades didn’t matter. http://www.newsfromme.com/2014/02/12/sid-caesar-r-p/
